Tale of the DDD
by pkmnguy
Summary: On the night Naruto learns of the creature inside him, a stranger appears, a boy on his own path, with his own secrets, and his own story. This is the story of that boy, as he discovers his own way, and helps any that he meets to find their own. But as this storyline sways from the original, what terrors will it unleash, new foes will arise? You'll just have to read and find out!
1. Chapter 1

The tale of the DDD

Chapter One

The night was still and quiet on the road to Konoha. The only noise to be heard, a quiet _crunch, crunch_ of footsteps. A red haired boy walked along, hefting a large backpack on his shoulders, the top just going over the top of his head. As he looked ahead, he could just barely see the great walls of the village hidden in the leaves.

A grin split his face as he saw the great Hokage faces sculpted into the mountain. "I finally made it" He muttered under his breath. "Finally, after all these years of roaming, I'm finally here..."

Before he could take any more steps towards the village, he heard yelling from the forest to his left. He frowned as he turned in the direction of the noise, craning his head as he strained to hear what was being said, but to no avail. His frown deepened, and he leapt up into the trees, sticking to the nearest branch with chakra before pushing off from it, propelling himself further through the leaves. After only a minute or so, he found the source of the shouting.

He hid himself in the tree leaves as he observed the scene. A boy wearing a horrifically ugly tracksuit was stood in the middle of the clearing looking up with a frightened expression. The boy had bright blonde hair and, oddly enough, 3 whisker marks on each cheek. There was also a giant scroll strapped to his back There was also a man wearing the standard garb of a Konoha chunnin nearby, pinned to a log by several Kunai. He had brown hair styled almost like a pineapple and a scar running across his nose.

Then a voice spoke up from a nearby tree causing the redhead to look up. "Naruto, Iruka's just trying to scare you cause he doesn't want you to have the scroll!" The man speaking had silver hair under a bandanna with the Konoha plate on it. He also wore the standard Konoha chunnin garb, except with two giant Shurikens strapped to his back.

"Huh?" Asked the now named Naruto from the ground.

"Stop lying Mizuki!" The pineapple-headed chunin yelled "Don't let him trick you Naruto!"

But Mizuki simply chuckled. "Oh I'll tell you who's really lying"

Suddenly Iruka's eyes widened. "NO MIZUKI!" He roared, but the silver haired chunin continued.

"They've been lying to you your whole life Naruto, since the decree 12 years ago" Naruto, his eyes filled with confusion spoke up.

"W-what decree?" he muttered. Meanwhile the redhead's thoughts rushed back and forth on what to do as the Konoha shinobi continued to argue. _'Damnit, I'd jump in and try to help, but I don't know who to side with here...Scar face doesn't seem to mean harm to the kid, but that could be just a ploy...and the one in the bandanna seems like a prick, but everyone has their reasons...DAMNIT!'_ His teeth gritted in frustration but he gasped at what he heard next.

"THE NINE-TAILED FOX IS INSIDE YOU!" Yelled Mizuki, pointing at Naruto with a victorious grin "THE FOX SPIRIT THAT KILLED SO MANY PEOPLE AND NEARLY DESTROYED THIS VILLAGE WAS SEALED INSIDE YOU! YOU _ARE_ THE NINE TAILED FOX!"

"STOP IT!" Howled Iruka, as he struggled against the kunai pinning him to the log. But Mizuki simply smirked and carried on.

"They've all been sneaking around, hiding things from you your whole life!" Didn't you think it was strange how they treated you? Like dirt! Like they hated you for just being alive!"

Naruto's face contorted into a grimace as tears ran down his face. "NO! No no no no no!" he bawled as chakra began to flair up all around him.

Mizuki's grin transformed into a snarl. "That's why you will never be accepted into this village!" He reached back and took a Shuriken from his back "Even your beloved Sensei hates your guts!" He began to spin it in his hand. "NOW DIE NARUTO!" He threw his hand forward, propelling the Shuriken down toward the boy, still paralysed with what he'd just learned. Iruka yelled out in fear, struggling against the kunai that trapped him, but it was unneeded, the redhead had heard enough.

Naruto looked up, paralysed with fear as the Shuriken shot towards him at incredible speeds. Then, just as it was about to hit him, a red and brown blur appeared in front of him, and a loud muffled thud and _SQUELCH_ rang through the clearing. Standing above him grimacing in pain was a red haired boy, who looked about the same age as him, but was about a foot taller. He wore a long brown leather trenchcoat over a dark green T-shirt, with brown shinobi-style pants with many pockets and black trainers. He also had a huge brown backpack over his back, which was now spilling out spare clothes and some packets of food onto the floor, along with a decent bit of blood.

The blonde's eyes continued upwards to the his saviour's face, to be met with bright red hair, pale skin, electric yellow eyes and a huge grin. "Don't you listen to that prick Naruto" He grunted.

"Huh?" Naruto's jaw dropped as he watched the boy grimace in pain for a moment before the grin returned.

"First off, just cause you've got the Kyuubi sealed inside you, that doesn't mean you are the fox, you're it's damn jailer! It's because of you that the beast isn't trashing your village! Second, and don't you DARE let anyone tell you different, having that thing inside you isn't just a curse, it's a blessing too!"

The redhead continued to smirk as he watched the confused look on the boy's face. "Waddya mean it's a blessing? I've got a massive demon stuck in my body and the whole village hates me for it!" The redhead's grin increased as he leaned forward.

"A massive demon...made entirely of chakra!" He hissed in Naruto's ear, delighting in watching the boy's eyes widen even further.

"That power can be harnessed, ya know!" He continued. "I come from the village hidden in the clouds, and there's two people there who have demons inside them, and let me tell you this! They are two of the strongest shinobi in the village! That big monster of yours is one hell of an asset if you learn to use it correctly!"

His speech was cut short when a foot came out of nowhere to kick him away from Naruto, leaving him strewn on the forest floor, face down. Naruto gasped as he saw that two of the giant Shuriken's edges had pierced his back, tearing through his backpack and jacket ,spilling blood everywhere. _'He just saved my life!'_ Naruto thought. _'And he didn't even know me!'_ His eyes narrowed as he turned to the leaf traitor, who was still staring at the downed redhead in anger. "Little punk got in the way" he grunted "No matter, I'll just-" his muttering was cut short by an onslaught of _POOF_ noises.

The clearing was now filled with hundreds of jumpsuit wearing blondes, all glaring at Mizuki. "He just saved me, for just about no reason" Growled one Naruto "The least I can do is return the favour!" yelled another. Mizuki's fists clenched in fear as he stared at the army that had appeared from nowhere, but it was too late.

The forest was then filled with the sounds of punching, kicking, and screaming.

* * *

Naruto glared down at the unconscious body of Mizuki before a thought came to him. "Iruka sensei!" He spun around and ran up to his teacher, quickly pulling out the Kunai that were pinning him to the log. Iruka just stared down at him

"Naruto, what was that?" The boy just looked up at him with a worried look in his cerulean eyes

"Are you alright sensei?"

"I'm fine Naruto, but...what you just did-"

Naruto just grinned up at his teacher "I kicked his ass good, huh Iruka-sensei?"

Iruka's concerned stare was replaced with a tired smile "Yes, yes you did Naruto" he then turned around to look at the red haired boy on the floor. His eyes returned to their previous state of concern as he ran towards the prone body. He reached out and carefully examined the boy's wounds, removing the Shuriken and then quickly bandaging his back with some gauze from his Kunai holster. Luckily, the thick backpack and jacket had slowed the weapon down quite well, leaving the the cut fairly shallow.

"Is he gonna be alright, Iruka sensei?" Naruto asked, standing behind him.

Iruka nodded, turning back to his student. "I think so, but we should get him to the hospital, just in case. Do you think you could make a few more clones to help out?"

"There's no need" Said a gravelly voice from behind the two. They both jumped and spun around to see an old man at the edge of the clearing smiling at them.

"Hokage-sama?"

"Jiji!"

Naruto immediately dashed forward and hugged the Hokage, who caught him. "I'm sorry Jiji! I'm so sorry!" Naruto shouted as he pressed into the Hokage's chest, who realised with a start that Naruto was crying.

"it's fine Naruto, it's not your fault" He said gently, as he patted the boy on the head.

"But-but I betrayed you, I stole from you!" the blonde whimpered as he continued to hide his face.

"Naruto, Mizuki tricked you, you couldn't have known. If anything, it was my fault for not watching you closer. Besides, even though you made a mistake, you fixed it, didn't you?" Naruto raised his head up to look at the old man's face, sniffling.

"Huh?" he mumbled, confused.

"Yes, you may have taken the scroll, but you stopped Mizuki, and now he will pay for his crimes. In fact..." He reached behind himself, into a back pocket. "I'd say that with the competence you showed in revealing this traitor, your swift defeat of him, and the learning of the Shadow Clone Jutsu to such a degree, warrants you an official-" He revealed what he was holding in his hand, a Konoha Hitai-ate "Promotion to Genin of the village." The boy gaped, before grabbing the headband and quickly tying it to cover his forehead.

The hokage smiled down at him before walking around him to look down at the redhead who was now lying face up with his backpack under his head, still unconscious. He made a small hand gesture and three ANBU members leapt down from the trees. Two grabbed Mizuki, before Shunshining away with him, while the other leaned down over the redhead. They held their hand out and scanned down his body, the green light of Chakra covering their hand. After a minute or so of silence, the chakra faded away. "He'll be fine, Hokage-sama" The ANBU reported with a feminine voice. "His jacket was vey well made, it almost stopped the Shuriken completely. he should recover in a few days. If he's lucky, it may not even scar"

Hiruzen smiled down at him. "So, are you going to stop faking sleep soon or do I need to ask politely?" He asked. The boy's eyes opened, fixing the village leader with an almost lazy smirk

"Hehe, sorry. I prefer to stay a fly on the wall." He looked over at Naruto "Congratulations kid, you're gonna go far."

Naruto grinned back at him "You're damn right I am! I'm gonna be Hokage someday! Believe it!"

The redhead chuckled "I do" he muttered before pushing himself into a sitting position and looking uo at the Hokage with a small smirk "So, you gonna kill me now, or when blondie over there has gone home?" The Hokage's eyes widened in surprise as Naruto watched in confusion.

"Kill you? Jiji would never do something like that...would you?" he turned his head to the Hokage as the redhead spoke up again.

"Kid, you being a Jinchuuriki is such a big village secret that even you didn't know about it, and now not just an outsider, but someone from Kumo knows? Yeah, they're not gonna let that get out-" He was interrupted by quiet laughter from the old man standing above him.

"I'm not going to kill you, young one, in fact..." The Hokage then reached behind his back again, before pulling out another Hitai-ate "You seem like a very competent young man, if you're interested, I could use someone like you in our ranks"

The redhead looked at the headband with distrust. "No way is it that easy"

The hokage nodded at this "It's true, there will be some paperwork to go through, along with a basic questioning by one of our village's interrogators to make sure you're not a spy"

The redhead gulped at this, but nodded "Well...alright, so long as he doesn't actually like, interrogate me..." Hiruzen chuckled again "worry not, I'll be there too, I'll make sure they don't go too far, it'll just be basic questioning. For now though, could you at least tell me your name?"

The redhead grinned at this, before reaching up to take the headband, wrapping it around his wrist tightly and offering his hand to the Hokage to shake it. Hiruzen accepted the shake and the two locked eyes. "The name's Denziel. Just Denziel"

 **A/N: Well, that was the first chapter of The Tale of the DDD. Please bear with me, this is my first fanfiction I've written, and I'm still trying to get things down. The biggest thing I've been struggling with is paragraph placement, especially during conversations, but with practise and any advice reviews can give me, I'm sure I'll improve.**

 **One last thing, yes I will explain what the "DDD" are...later. if my plans for the story stay on course, it should be explained during or right after the Invasion of Konoha arc.**

 **Thank you for any support you can send me and I hope you look forward to the next chapter as much as I do!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N So, I'm sorry it took so long to upload this chapter. I know there's like one guy following, but I'm still sorry. I had this chapter ready for quite a while, but been having some confidence problems about posting. But here we go, please enjoy...**

Chapter Two

The now named Denziel sighed in annoyance as he sat in the Hokage's office across the table from the village's esteemed leader. The source of his irritation was obvious: the good 20 pages of paperwork he was going through to have himself inducted as a Genin of the village.

Hiruzen chuckled at the boy "You know, if you didn't sigh after every sentence you wrote, we'd have been done with this at least half an hour ago" the boy looked up at the Hokage, his gaze as irritated as his vocal chords

"Yeah well, I don't much like writing. Hell, I don't think I've ever wrote this much in my life" The Hokage chuckled again as he pulled over the first 19 pages of the paperwork to look over. The boy's past seemed quite simple from what he had written down. Orphaned at a young age when his single mother died, he decided that he didn't much like the way Kumogakure was, so with some help from some ninja who were family friends, he packed basic survival gear and left his mountaintop home, looking for somewhere he belonged.

Sarutobi looked up at the boy who was struggling to think about whether he had any medical conditions of note. "So I assume these family friends taught you the tree walking technique?"

Denziel looked up from the paper and gave a short nod "Among other things" he looked down at the paper, crossed a few things off and signed his name, before handing it to Hiruzen. The Hokage looked over the papers then looked up with a smile "That should be all we need, now I'll need you to come in tomorrow to get your picture taken to go along with this, but other than that you're free to explore the village. Now, I expect you have questions?"

Denziel got up out of his chair with a smile and stretched, before pushing both hands into the small of his back, resulting in several audible popping noises "Just a few, number one: where will I be staying, number two: are there any shinobi tailors in the village and three: when is my first mission?"

Hiruzen smirked at the boys eagerness and began to speak as he arranged the forms he was signing "Well, as the first one, that's up to you, there are a lot of hotels or apartments you can take around the village, you will be getting a weekly stipend for being a certified Genin, but you can choose what to do" Denziel smiled at that as he turned around to stare out of the window, leaning on the sill comfortably "For the second, I believe there is a small shop not far from the main gate which sells shinobi weaponry, tools, armor and basic clothing as well. it should be fairly easy to find, it's quite sizable, name is 'Shinobi Outfitting' quite generic, but it sums it up. As for the last question, you won't be getting one for a while, most likely"

The redhead frowned as he turned around "What do you mean? Why not? Isn't Genin the rank where shinobi start getting missions?"

Sarutobi sighed and got up from his chair to stand next to the boy staring out of the window "I'm afraid it's not as simple as that, we have certain procedures that need to be followed. All ninja at Genin level are teams of three with one Jōnin sensei. Thanks to this, you are not a full Genin yet, but what we refer to as a 'Standby Genin'. Until we can find you a team, you are limited to joining as somewhat of a fifth wheel for other teams who need assistance"

Denziel's frown deepened at this "However, I do have good news!" his head shot up, looking at the Hokage with curious eyes "Since you are a new Genin of the village and your previous equipment was sadly ruined thanks to a traitor of our village, I have decided to give you these" The hokage reached into a drawer in his desk and retrieved a tied together stack of Ryō bills "These should be enough to replace or repair your equipment and for about a week in a hotel, as well as the food for that week. I'm sure we'll have found you some missions to go on with other teams by then"

Denziel's yellow orbs widened at the large stack of bills "A-Arigatou Hokage-sama!" He quickly went to bow in thanks, but was stopped by a hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see the smile on the village leader's face.

"It's nothing, my boy. we here in the Leaf Village look after our own. Isn't that why you came here in the first place?" Denziel went to speak, but simply nodded and smiled, before accepting the Ryō. He then picked up his trenchcoat and patted at the inside of it, looking concerned before smiling and closing his eyes for a second. A small flash came from where he had pressed his hand to the coat, then faded showing a plain black wallet which he deposited the bills back into before sealing it away again. Hiruzen's eyes widened at this ' _A storage seal? Well it's not exactly uncommon, but they tend to be quite pricy outside of the main villages_ ' externally, however, he said nothing, just watched as the redhead carefully picked up his backpack, holding it upside down to keep his things falling out of the hole in the bottom.

"Well, I suppose I'll see you tomorrow Hokage-sama" he said, pulling his coat on, before heading to the doorway. But before he left, he turned and looked at the old man "By the way, I was too nervous to say it earlier, but when you see that purple haired lady, tell her I think she's got a kick ass fashion sense" He smirked, and left the room.

Hiruzen chuckled, remembering the look on the boy's face when he had encountered Anko, half embarrasment, half admiration, then later all fear when she had questioned him, though he had held up quite well against her. "I shall my boy, I shall" He chuckled under his breath again, before turning to get back to something he had to admit he shared the boy's negative feelings for...paperwork.

* * *

The newly instated standby Genin wandered down the street slowly, as he looked around at the village he now lived in _'It's so different from Kumo, everyone is so cheerful and friendly'_ he looked up just in time to see a team of Chunin running along the rooftops above him. The sight surprised him, and he fumbled with his bag for a second, struggling to keep it upright and it's contents inside. He was quickly reminded of where he was supposed to be going and, looking down, realised that he was completely lost. For some reason, his feet had decided to lead him down a different path from the one he'd been meaning to go.

He sighed as he tried to get his bearings, but the buildings on either side of the path were simply too tall for him to see any landmarks. With a grunt of irritation he tightened his grip on his bag, and poured chakra into his feet, launching himself into the air to land on top of a nearby wall to survey the immediate area. As he surveyed his surroundings, he saw that he had accidentally landed on the wall of a Clan Compound. He looked down to see that the compound seemed rather sparse, there were a few trees here and there, but other than that the place was empty.

 _'Huh, this place is empty, who even lives here anyway? Alright, second order of business after getting the coat fixed, find me a library and get a map.'_ Just as he was about to jump off, he was shocked by a sudden smashing sound behind him. He quickly forced chakra to his soles and launched off the wall to a rooftop outside the compound. While in midair, he spun himself around to look back and was rather confused by what he saw.

A window on the third floor of one of the clan buildings was broken, and there was a boy about his age leaping out. He was wearing a quite plain grey sweater and black jeans, with a Konoha headband on his head. The three most distinguishable things about him were the crossed swords on his back, the pineapple shaped haircut he was sporting, and the huge hyperactive grin on his face.

An angered face poked out from the window he'd just leaped out of and glared down at him "Heiki Nara you get back here this instant!" The woman yelled down at him. Denziel cast his gaze up at her and noted that she seemed quite dishevelled.

"HA! I don't think so Aunt Yoshi! You might've been a kickass kunoichi back in your day, but you're not gonna catch me! And it's not like you're gonna wake up your husband or son to do it for you!" The now identified 'Yoshi' frowned before closing the window with a bang, causing Heiki to gulp audibly and turn to dash off.

"You're pretty energetic for a Nara." He stumbled, his black eyes drawn up to the rooftop where the grinning redhead was standing watching.

"Oh hey...you saw that huh?" Heiki chuckled, scratching the back of his head, grinning awkwardly.

Denziel smirked and dropped down to ground level in front of the other boy, extending his hand "The name's Denziel, nice to meetcha"

Heiki smiled back and took his hand, shaking it firmly, then glanced down at the Headband awkwardly wrapped around his wrist. "Oh, you're a ninja too? I've not seen you around."

Denziel released his grip and nodded, his eyes glancing over the other boy's shoulder for a moment before going back to looking at him "Yeah, I only just got my stuff finalized today, sorta, still some stuff to sort out later, but I'm now an official standby genin of the village!"

"No way, me too!" Heiki replied with a grin.

"Seriously?" Denziel gaped, shocked at how quickly he'd met another shinobi of his rank

"Yeah, me and a girl in my class last year were left out of the team selections, so we were set to being standby gen- HURK!" He grunted, as a frying pan was smacked into the top of his skull.

"Yeah, and you'd better not forget that! I might have retired from the career, but I was a chunnin back in my day young man!" A furious Yoshino snapped at the boy, before turning to the redhead, who was smirking at her. "It's lovely to meet you, are you new to the village?"

"Yep, just arrived last night actually." Denziel chuckled as he glanced over at Heiki, who was now nursing a large lump on the back of his head.

"And you're a Genin already?" Yoshino replied, a surprised look on her face "That's quite quick, what happened?"

"Oh, err, I think that might be classified, you'd have to ask the Hokage about that. Let's just say, I helped him with some business last night and he offered me a place in the village as thanks." Denziel then glanced at Heiki again. "Anyway, I need to be heading off, I gotta get my coat and bag fixed"

Heiki's eyes lit up "Oh! Are you heading to Shinobi Outfitting?"

Denziel chuckled, a blush lighting up his face to almost the same color as his hair. "Hehe, yeah about that...I was actually on my way there but I kinda got lost and ended up here..."

"Oh, no problem! I'll show you the way!" Heiki said quickly, leaping up onto a nearby building. "C'mon! We'll be there in no time!"

Denziel simply raised an eyebrow at his enthusiasm, but shrugged and leapt after him, doing what he could to hold his bag together

As the pair of boys ran across the rooftops towards the shop, Denziel tried to strike up a conversation.

"So...how come you're so hyperactive?"

"Hrm?" Heiki turned his head to look at him "What do you mean?"

Denziel frowned "Cut the crap man, I only arrived in the village yesterday and I know all about the Nara's famous laziness. What makes you so different?"

Heiki looked away chuckling awkwardly "Hehe, yeah...well I'll be honest, I don't know why I'm like this. Ever since I was born I've just always been full of energy. Nothing really much to it but that."

Denziel gave a shrug "Fair enough, don't really need more of a reason than that I guess. By the way, is there a library around here?"

Heiki scratched his chin as he thought "I think there's one over that way" He pointed over to his left "I'll give you a hand with finding it later if you like"

Denziel smiled at this "Nah, you're good, I'll manage by myself, you've already helped out showing me to S.O. anyway."

Heiki grinned back "It's really no trouble, but if you insist- oh, speaking of which! Here we are now!"

The two landed on a rooftop across from a large building. Denziel looked over and saw several outfits on mannequins in the storefront windows.

As his gaze swept over them, he took note of the sheer vareity of clothes, there was a traditional Ninja outfit, all black with a slit for the eyes. There was more modern outfits with the Konoha headbands and flak jackets, why there was even a full set of samurai armor!

He hopped down to the street, narrowly avoiding landing on a vendor in a cart. With a rushed apology over his shoulder, he walked through the front door with his companion following close behind.

"Damn" he mumbled under his breath as he began to look over the products on display.

"Ya can say that again" Sighed Heiki, his gaze sweeping the store before his eyes locked onto something. "Well, I'll be off now, let me know whenever you want to properly form our team" Denziel grinned and the two shook hands, before the slightly shorter boy dashed off. The redhead turned to look around and spotted a girl wearing chinese-style clothes, a pink shirt with dark blue trousers. Her brown hair was tied up into two buns, making them look a bit like panda ears.

He made his way torwards her, walking past a stand of assorted maces and other heavy weapons to stand behind her. "Excuse me?" He asked quitely, only to leap backwards when one of the knives she'd been arranging was thrust in his direction. She glared at him with slightly bloodshot eyes, before shaking her head and quickly bowing her head.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry! I've not had much sleep, and you surprised me and-"

"it's fine!" He said loudly, now thankful of the practice he had of speaking over crowds. She looked up at him, clearly about to apologise again, but he beat her to it. "This is a ninja shop, if someone couldn't dodge that, they really shouldn't be in here"

The girl chuckled along with him at that, but soon straightened up, her face taking on a more business-like expression. "So" She began. "By those words, you must be a ninja too"

Denziel smirked and raised his right arm, showing the Hitai-ate wrapped around his wrist. "Best I can do for ID, I'm afraid, I don't get the card untill tomorrow"

She smiled and nodded, moving to the nearby desk "So, what are you looking for?"

Denziel shifted his upside-down backpack onto the surface next to the cash register "Repairs please, and hopefully some modifications" He then took his trenchcoat from around his shoulders and placed it down next to the bag.

The girl picked up the bag, and looked at the massive hole in the bottom, then looked over the rips in the jacket then glanced up at the redhead "Fuma Shuriken?"

His eyes widened, before he nodded quickly "Uh, how can you tell that just from looking?"

She looked back up to him with a huge grin, before striking a pose, one eye closed, a huge grin and folded arms "The name's Tenten! Konoha's Weapons Mistress!"

Denziel raised an eyebrow and cocked his head to the side. "So...you know weapons I guess?"

Tenten sighed, and dropped her pose to lean against the desk. "You're damn right I know weapons, any weapon in this store, I could give you the price, the weight, hell, even the details of how it was made and when! And don't even get me started on using them."

The redhead simply nodded "So in other words...yes, you know weapons."

She groaned and shook her head. "Never mind, now what was it you were saying about modifications?"

"Ah yes! I almost forgot about that, thanks" He quickly pulled the armband off of his wrist and placed it on the table. "Could you get me some fingerless gloves, and have that plate on the back of the right one?"

Tenten gave a short nod. "Yeah, a lot of people who come in here ask for different Hitai-ate placements, the headband ain't for everyone. We can do that."

He then scratched the back of his head. "Except...can you make it so I can like...slide it onto my knuckles?"

She frowned and cocked her head "So...like a knuckle duster?"

He chuckled "Yeah, sort of, but one that I can slide back and forth, so when I'm not using it, it stays on the back of my hand"

She nods, before quickly writing this onto a notepad she brought out of seemingly nowhere. "Anything else?"

He scratched his chin in thought "Nah, that should be it. OH! Could you fit some like, hidden armor plating in my trench?"

She looked at the coat. "Armor?"

He nodded "Yeah, nothing ridiculously thick, just enough to deflect kunai and such, ya know, small arms. But if you can't conceal it, don't bother."

The brunette picks up the trenchcoat and inspects it closely, feeling certain parts of the fabric before putting it back down and looking back up "I'll see what can be done, we'd have to be careful of the seal, but it should be doable. just be aware, it's gonna be pretty heavy afterwards"

Denziel nods with a smirk "I'm counting on it, so, how much do I owe you?" He waited patiently as she crunched some numbers and gives him the recipt. He quickly unseals his wallet and pays for it all.

With a nod, she accepts the money and puts it in the register. "We should have these modifications done in a couple days, until then, have a nice day!"

Denziel gave a nod "You too, it was nice to meet you!" He pocketed all the things he could keep and made to leave, but then turned around again "By the way, where is the library?"

A few minutes later, the redhead left the shop feeling considerably lighter physically and mentally.

* * *

As darkness fell over the village once again that night, a blonde boy was preparing dinner in the form of a ready-make ramen cup. As he took it out of the microwave and made to start eating, he heard his doorbell ring.

He sighed and placed the cup down on the table before moving to look through the peephole. When he saw the person on the other side of the door, he quickly scrambled to undo all the locks and opened the door.

"Denziel! It's great to see you!" He cheered happily.

The redhead grinned back at the shorter boy "Hey Naruto. I was hoping to ask a little favor from you."

The blonde nodded quickly "Sure! Anything!"

Denziel shook his head, chuckling. "You're gonna regret saying that in a minute...could I bunk on your couch for a while?" He looked at Naruto's wide, shocked eyes and quickly stammered out "I-I mean, I could stay at a hotel or something, but I figured I'd save some money, and then I could get my own apartment faster, and honestly, I could really use the company and don't worry, I'll pull my weight, I'll do the dishes if you like?"

"Yes" Naruto said quietly.

Denziel didn't seem to hear him, nervously rambling on. "I could do the laundry maybe? Go round to the shops for you if you want? Something like that-"

Naruto grabbed him by the upper arms, as that was the highest he could reach on the taller boy "I SAID YES DAMNIT!"

The redhead stared down at him, frowning lightly "Really? That easily?"

Naruto nodded frantically "Heck yeah! I'd love to have you here! Besides, you saved my life the other night, I owe you big time!"

Denziel smiled lightly "Thank you Naruto" He followed the blonde into the apartment, watching as he closed the door and couldn't help but narrow his eyes at the multitude of locks on it. _'God, how much must he get bothered if he has that many locks...'_

"I'm sorry, I don't have that much variation when it comes to food" Naruto said, handing the ramen cup he'd made a minute ago over to Denziel, before wandering over to the cupboard and getting another cup out.

Denziel glanced down at the cup before reading the label _'Beef? oh well, may as well try it'_ He moved the top over before grimacing at the large amounts of water inside. He walked over to the sink and drained the liquid out into it.

Naruto watched this and simply shrugged before turning and placing his own cup into the microwave. "So...I've actually been meaning to ask you..."

Denziel raised an eyebrow as he picked up a fork and tucked in. "Ask what?" He smiled down at the cup. "This is really good by the way"

Naruto chuckled. "Yeah, ramen's my favourite food. Anyway...I was wondering about...the jinchūriki in the cloud village. What are they like?"

"Well, I don't really know that much about them, I left the village four years ago...so it's been a while. But one of them, Bee, he was almost like a brother to me. He's the one who taught me how to use chakra. Nothing special, just tree walking, but it was still nice of him to do it. He was cool like that, always helpful to those who needed it. As for Yugito, I didn't know her that well. I met her a few times, but we never really talked." He glanced over at Naruto, who seemed to be looking sad at listening to the story.

"So...people really looked up to them, huh?"

"Hey, chin up!" Denziel snapped. Naruto looked up at him, surprise in his face at the almost angry tone in the taller boy's voice. "Just give it time" He continued,in a more soothing tone "He's in like, his 30s or something, you're just a preteen brat, you just need time to show this dumb place what you can do."

Naruto gained a small smile at this, but it was quickly replaced with a pissed expression. "HEY! WHO'RE YOU CALLING PRETEEN? I'M 14 YEARS OLD DAMNIT!"

"14? ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME? WHY'RE YOU SO DAMN SHORT?"

"SHUT IT! I'M A LATE BLOOMER YOU LANKY ASS!" Naruto folded his arms, glaring at the floor. Denziel moved forward, about to apologise when a _*ding*_ interrupted him. The shorter boy's frown suddenly transformed into a grin as he spun around, grabbed the cup out of the microwave and began to wolf down the food inside.

The pair chatted for a while after they finished the dinner, the short shouting match seemingly forgotten. After an hour or so, they both retired, Naruto to his room, and Denziel to the couch, with a thin blanket over his curled up body. He lay awake for a while, reading through the books he'd bought from the library, which thankfully had also doubled as a bookstore.

* * *

A week later found Denziel leaping from rooftop to rooftop, occasionally doing a barrel roll as he passed over streets. He had his backpack firmly secured behind him, and was wearing his new gloves, which had his Hitai-ate attahed to the right one with two bands of Chakra Elastic.

According to Tenten, all he had to do was channel chakra directly into the elastic, and it would slacken. But the moment he stopped, it would immediately tighten again. He had tested it out a few times, and it worked quite well. The best part was, he could channel chakra into his glove, and it would not affect the elastic, so he was free to use any techniques, so long as his skin did not touch the elastic directly.

He'd also retrieved his trench, although that had taken a few days longer. They'd unsewn it and found the correct metals to attach inside, they just wanted to make sure it wasn't too much. After carrying the metals in his backpack for a few minutes, he'd happily said it was fine, returned the metal and left.

Actually, he'd been quite tired after holding the weight for just that short time, but that was his plan. He figured, if he wore his coat for whenever he was doing things, he'd get stronger. Or at the very least, he'd get faster. So far, he wasn't sure if this would work or not. In the past few days since getting it, he'd noticed a large drop in his speed and endurance, but he hoped it would return soon.

He stopped his running to catch his breath, then looked around to see where in the village he was. He frowned lightly when he saw he'd once again found himself in front of a clan compound. A quick check of the map he kept in his pocket told him this was the Inuzuka compound.

Suddenly he felt an odd pulling sensation. He couldn't explain it, but a part of himself was telling him to go inside. He pondered on the feeling for a while. He would admit that he got nosy quite a bit, but never like this. It felt like his brain was filled with whispers of _'Go on...Go inside...'_

Normally, he would have found such a sensation odd, suspicious, but for some reason, he decided to follow it. But cautiously. He saw a tree sprouting against the inside of the clan compound, with a branch running parallel to the wall. He leapt to this branch, before dropping into a crouch.

As he observed the yard, he immediately noted differences from the Nara compound. The grass here looked meticulously cared for. It was also a lot bigger, no surprise considering what he'd read about the Inuzuka. As he continued looking around, he saw a girl around his age run around one of the buildings. His eyes focused in on her, watching her long flowing orange hair which was pulled back into a pony tail. It was insanely long, almost reaching her trousers, in fact.

Speaking of her apparel, she was wearing fairly normal shinobi pants, with a bright red button up shirt. While running she was watching behind her, but as she turned back, he noticed she had the customary red fang tattoos that all Inuzuka members have on their cheeks. He found himself lost in thought for a moment, wondering about how young they must be when they get the tattoos.

A barking roused him from these thoughts, and he saw the girl had been joined by a small black dog which barely came up to her shins. He sat in the tree watching the two run around and play for several minutes. They did all the usual things owners did with their pets, she threw a ball, they had a tug of war with a rope, but when they got around to doing tricks, that was when things got strange.

She went to a duffel bag which was leaning against a nearby wall and got out a large gauntlet. It looked like it was made out of some kind of foam, and reached up to just below her elbow. She faced the dog and raised the arm in front of her before speaking up in a soft but clear voice "Disarm!"

The small dog's stance had changed. Whereas before it had been standing up straight with a wagging tail, at the mere sight of the gauntlet, it lowered it's head to the ground and bared it's teeth. As soon as the girl spoke, it launched itself forward, running in a zigzagging pattern before leaping up at her, sinking it's teeth into the foam of the gauntlet. It swung it's body, the momentum causing her arm to swing behind her, the dog finding purchase with it's feet on the ground and keeping her arm there.

She pulled with her arm for a few seconds before seeing that she could not pull free, and pulled out a small dog treat from her pocket, throwing it behind the dog. "Good boy!" she praised, smiling happily.

They continued like this for a while, the dog performing more tricks like this, such as "Intercept" where she threw a blunted Kunai past him, and he had to catch it by the handle, or "Retrieve" where she placed a scroll in her back pocket, and it had to get past her to steal it. The small canine was able to do all of them, and gained a lot of belly rubs for his successes.

The training took quite a while however, and when the pair seemed almost done with the exercises, there was a sudden change in the breeze going through the village. A few seconds after this, the dog turned and raised it's hackles at the tree Denziel was sitting in, growling at him. Denziel sighed and deftly hopped down, his arms in the air peacefully. He made sure to show the back of his right hand, with the Leaf village symbol on it shining brightly against the sun.

The girl, who had gone into a defensive stance when she heard her dog growling, relaxed at the sight of the symbol. She offered a small smile at him and spoke up "H-hello, are you looking for someone?"

Denziel chuckled quietly and shook his head. "Not really, I was just wandering the village aimlessly and happened upon your little training session here. I've been there since you two started, he's an impressive pup"

At the mention of her dog, the girl quickly brightened up, her smile widening "Oh yes, He's fantastic, isn't he! We've been training hard for the past year, waiting to get put on active duty."

"Active duty?" He asked curiously, cocking his head. "Wait, don't tell me you're a Standby Genin?"

"Y-yes" She stuttered, looking at him "Is there something wrong?"

"I wouldn't say something wrong, though I must apologise as it seems I've fibbed a bit. I am in fact looking for someone. You."

The girl's eyes widened at this. "M-me? Wh-why would you be looking for me?"

Denziel grinned, then suddenly shot forward using his chakra to stand just a few feet in front of her, before extending his hand. "Denziel, fellow standby Genin"

She squeaked loudly, jumping back when he appeared so close to her, but recovered when she heard his words, and accepted his hand slowly. "K-Kake Inuzuka...and this is Beck" She almost whispered, gesturing down towards the dog standing next to her, who barked up at the redhead.

Denziel slowly knelt down and pulled off his glove, before offering his hand forward, palm upwards. Beck sniffed at his hand a few times before glaring up at him. Denziel looked at him softly, waiting patiently. The dog then yapped happily before leaping forward to give his chin a few small licks.

The tall boy giggled at the tickling sensation, before looking up at the girl, an unanswered question in his eyes.

Kake frowned nervously, but at seeing how friendly her familiar was with this boy...She gave a short nod at him "If you are wanting to be in a team with me, I accept"

He raised an eyebrow at her "Really? That easily?"

She nodded more firmly, leaning down to pick up Beck and placing him on her shoulder, where he then proceeded to drape himself over the back of her neck. "If he likes you, that's all I need."

The redhead went to question her further, then stopped. He turned around and hopped up onto the clan compound wall, turning to look at her over his shoulder. "Well? No time like the present, huh?"

Kake hesitated, but gave a firm nod, her sky blue eyes taking on a steely determination. "Right."

The two leapt off to get Heiki, before heading to the Hokage's office where they told him of their intentions.

"Very well then." He said, as he passed them each a form which needed only a signature. "Seeing as you three are the only standby Genin in the village, I knew it'd only be a matter of time, so I prepared this for you. Just sign and it's done."

Denziel looked to his sides nervously. The two people he would soon be depending on with his life simply looked back at him with smiles. One wide and excited, the other small and timid.

But both equally ready. And if they were ready, why the hell couldn't he be? He signed his name and passed it back to Hiruzen with a smirk.

The Hokage smiled back at the three.

"Then I now pronounce you. Kake Inuzuka. Heiki Nara. Denziel. You will henceforth be known as."

"Team 13"

 **A/N So, what'd you think? I hope it wasn't too much, but I needed to get this all out in one chapter otherwise my whole plan would crumble. Never realised how long it would take but oh well.**

 **So, I'm hoping my writing style is improving, I'm doing all I can to make this as enjoyable as I can make it. Don't worry, the endless conversations end soon...until they start again just a little bit after.**

 **I'm sorry! It's just how I get stuff across best. Anyway, serious talk. We've got proper action next chapter, so stay tuned and do follow so you know the moment it's out. And if you've got some feedback, hit it in the review, so long as it's genuine constructive criticism, I'll at least look over it, and maybe even reply.**

 **So until next time. Laters!**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N Well, I didn't expect such a positive response from people! Taking into account how many people are clearly enjoying it, I'll be releasing all the chapters I've got in the next couple of days, chapter 5 is the last one that's finished, once that one is uploaded, I'll get cracking finishing chapter 6.**

 **Quick reply to the reviewer who pointed out that Denziel's name sticks out a bit compared to the rest. Yeah...I'm a bit far along to change his name now, but I wouldn't even if I could. Bear in mind that he's not from Konoha where they all have fairly traditional japanese names. He's from the lightning village, where they literally have people with names that are a single letter. So, I appreciate the constructive criticism, but Denziel is here to stay.**

 **With that over and done with, enjoy!**

Chapter Three

The hokage smiled at the trio in front of him. He always prided himself in being able to sense potential, and this team was brimming with it! Now just to test it out...

"Alright you three, I know it is quite sudden, but I have your first mission for you." He turned to the side of the room and gave a small motion with his head. From the shadows near the ceiling, a figure dropped down. As they stepped out into the light, the newly formed team were able to see more features of the man, or rather, not very many. His bottom half of his face was covered with a mask, while the top half was covered with his Hitai-ate, which was pulled down to cover his left eye. The only actual thing that could be seen of him was the shock of bright white hair that stuck up from his head at a slight angle, pretty much defying gravity.

"Hey there." He said, with a laid back tone of voice. "The name's Kakashi Hatake, I'm the Jōnin in charge of Genin team 7. Just two hours ago, we left the village on a mission to the Land of Waves, but we were ambushed on the way by a pair of Chūnin. We managed to fight them off, but my team and I believed it would be prudent to request backup on this mission."

Hiruzen looked back at the team with a questioning gaze. "So Team 13, do you accept this mission?"

Kake and Heiki both looked at Denziel unsurely. He returned their looks with a small frown, and turned back to the Hokage with a firm expression. "Hai, Hokage-sama. My team is ready."

The Hokage nodded with a smile. "Well Kakashi, it's up to you from here on out."

The Jōnin nodded and turned to the trio. "I'm only a shadow clone, so I don't have long. You're to meet me in front of the main village gate in half an hour and we will leave."

All three members nodded, and dashed out of the door in their respective directions. Kakashi turned to look at the Hokage with a worried look in his eye. "You really think they're ready for this? They're about as green as you can get."

Sarutobi chuckled lightly. "Kake and Heiki have both been training for a whole year since they were promoted, and Denziel has been taking care of himself for years now. They'll be just fine."

* * *

The group of four soon found themselves leaping through branches toward the Land of Waves. As they ran, Denziel took a moment to look at his team's Shinobi gear.

Heiki had his pair of blades strapped in a cross scabbard on his back. His Hitai-ate was at the very centre of the cross. He wore dark green shinobi pants with a kunai holder on both shins. For his upper wear, he had a waist-long jacket with metal plates on the outside of his forearms, carefully separated so that they didn't limit his arm movement. He also wore a pair of brown athletic trainers.

In contrast to the armour her teammate had covering his arms, Kake's arms were bare, with her wearing a sleeveless denim blue shirt. The symbol of the leaf village was sewn into one of the pockets on her breast. She also wore some black shorts which just came to her knees, and had a kunai holster strapped to her left thigh. As for her footwear, she had a pair of black sandals, with no socks.

Denziel took a moment to glance downwards at himself. He had his customary trench on. Thankfully, it wasn't weighing him down too much, and he was back up to about 80% of his normal speed. He had his black jeans on which came all the way down to his black trainers. Under his trench, he'd gone with a T-shirt with a design of realistic rain on it. He'd figured it would be appropriate for this mission.

He rolled his shoulder lightly as he adjusted the backpack he was holding. Well, make that TWO backpacks. He'd offered to carry Heiki's back, so the boy could reach his swords better if he needed them, but the extra weight was starting to get to him. Suddenly, a thought came to him.

"Hey Kakashi! That ambush you talked about, did it happen near here?"

The silver haired Jōnin turned and looked at him over his shoulder. "Yes, not far ahead, on the main path."

The redhead gave a thoughtful nod, before looking in the direction of the road. "You guys keep going, I'll catch up with you!"

Kakashi was about to order the boy otherwise, before realising the boy would likely be fine, given he was able to care for himself for multiple years alone. "Fine, but I want you at the boat to the Land of waves in one hour!"

Denziel smirked back at him. "Oh, don't you worry, I'll probably beat you guys there" And with that, he leapt off, heading in the direction of the path.

Kake glanced over at Heiki and spoke up "Do you know what he's up to?"

Heiki laughed. "With that guy, Kami knows."

The trio continued on for about 45 minutes of near constant running through the trees until the trees ended. They looked out to where they could see Team 7, along with Tazuna chatting with each other on a boat. Kakashi's shadow clone dispersed, leaving Kake and Heiki to approach the group.

Kakashi stood up straight and turned to look at the pair. But before he could speak up, a pale face poked itself out from between Kakashi and Naruto.

"Well it's about bloody time! I was getting bored!" Kake and Heiki gawped at the sight of Denziel standing there.

Heiki took a few steps forward and pointed at him. "How in the hell are you here before us?"

The redhead just smirked a cocky smirk back at them. "I'm a fast runner Heiki, and don't you forget it!" He was interrupted, however, when Naruto rolled his eyes and stepped in front of him.

"Don't be too impressed, he only arrived like, 5 minutes ago, and he spent a full minute on the floor panting"

Denziel glared at the shorter boy, but sighed and shook his head. "Alright, fair enough, wasn't exactly gonna keep that one up for very long. Anyway! Introductions!"

He pointed towards a sour-looking boy who was sitting on the boat. He had black hair which spiked up at the back, a blue shirt and white shorts. His hands were clenched in front of his face, and he was glaring out at the water. "That's Sasuke Uchiha, so not much introductions are needed there." Heiki and Kake both nodded, they'd both heard the stories of what had happened to the Uchiha family many years previously, how could they not have?

"I already told both of you about Naruto on the way here, so no introductions are needed there either" He then jerked his thumb in the direction of a girl wearing a red dress with white circular designs. She also had bright pink hair, with her Hitai-ate used as a hairband on top of her head. "This is Sakura Haruno"

The pinkette smiled at the newcomers, and went to shake their hands "It's very nice to meet you both, I've had to listen to Naruto going on and on about Denziel, so maybe now that we've actually met him in person he'll shut the hell up" She glared back at the blonde in question as she said this, causing him to lower his head and sigh.

He then pointed at the man standing over to the side "This is our client, the bridge builder Tazuna" The man was dressed plainly, a dark brown shirt and sandy coloured shorts, a heavy-looking backpack, and a wide brimmed hat, which looked rather like an onion.

"Alright everyone, now that introductions are over and done with, we really should get going now" Kakashi spoke up, gesturing towards the boat. The group all agreed and squeezed themselves onto to small vessel.

* * *

Roughly an hour later and the members of Team 13 were slowly going insane. The boat had been continuing at a slow pace to make sure that no-one spotted them. This wasn't what was annoying them, as Kakashi had already informed them about the reason behind it. Their client, a man named Tazuna, was building a bridge in an effort to help trade in the Land of Waves, but a local business tycoon named Gatō did not support that, as he essentially owned the small island thanks to his monopoly of the waterways. The bridge being built would destroy that, which is why he had hired Missing-nin to eliminate the man.

Again, all of this was perfectly understood by the team. The could understand the need for slowness and secrecy, and after a few conversations with the man, they actually grew to like the man. Sure, he put up the mask of an angry drunk, but once the real circumstances behind his village were revealed, it was obvious he simply acted this way to avoid being marked as a target.

"PLEEEEEEAAAAASE SASUKE-KUN! JUST THE ONE DATE" Denziel grit his teeth in irritation at the source of his anger. The ungodly loud pink-haired banshee on Naruto's team had been slowly driving him nuts, and a slight glance to the side told him Heiki and Kake weren't doing much better. Heiki had taken one of his blades out, and was carefully going over it with a cloth, adding a special coating which would stop any potential rusting in the damp air. Kake's coping mechanism had mostly been to pet Beck, but the redhead could clearly see she was reaching the end of her tether. She had taken to biting her lip for the past hour, and it was starting to draw blood.

It was this sight that made him realise he had to do something, as the leader of his team. His gaze snapped over to the green-eyed girl who was gazing at the Uchiha with little to no regard for her surroundings. "Would you shut the hell up Pinky?" He snapped, fixing her with a deathly glare. "We're not in the damn classroom anymore, this is a real mission now, against real enemy ninja. If you don't pay attention, your precious future with _Sasuke-kun_ could be over with the slightest slash of a kunai."

Sakura looked back at him with wide, shocked eyes. This wasn't the Denziel that Naruto had talked about. He'd described the boy as kind and thoughtful, not harsh and rude. If it had been someone else like Naruto saying those words to her, Sakura would have fired back at him with some choice words, but the glare that the redhead was fixing her caused the girl to be rooted to her seat. She decided to quieten down, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to get an earful when they got to their destination.

Denziel sighed happily at the gentle silence that surrounded the two teams as they made their way along past Tazuna's incomplete bridge. "We'll be ashore in just a few minutes" The boat's rower quietly announced. The two teams shared a smile at this, glad to be able to stretch their legs.

Once they reached the shore, the group disembarked, with Tazuna giving a quiet thanks and a handful of Ryō to the rower before they set off.

As they strolled along the misty path, Denziel noticed that Naruto was acting a lot more on edge than usual. The short blonde boy was darting around left and right, as if someone was going to dart out of one of the bushes or trees that lined the path.

"THERE!" The boy suddenly spun to the right, hurling his Kunai into a shrub, making a loud _THUNK_. The redhead raised an eyebrow, and gestured for Heiki to check the shrub, as he was closest. The brunette carefully peered over the plant, before giving a sigh.

"It's nothing, just a rabbit" He moved the bush to the side, revealing a rabbit frozen, unmoving, as the weapon Naruto had thrown was just inches from piercing it's skull.

The blonde made to rush over, but Denziel grabbed him by the head and pulled him back, to look him in the eye. "Naruto, listen. You gotta calm the hell down" he growled quietly. "This ain't a game anymore, we're on a real mission, with real consequences, got it?"

Naruto looked down at the ground, giving a short nod. "Yeah, I get it, I'm sorry. It's just, well like you said, it's a real mission now. I wanted to show the rest of you I had what it takes. You weren't there, but when those two attacked us on the road before, I was useless. I didn't move. Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei had to do all the work for me."

The redhead gave a low chuckle, ruffling his hair, before saying quietly "I get it kiddo, just calm down alright? You wanna show you're a ninja? Ninja are calm, collected and they sure as hell don't act rashly like you just did. Learn from that, kay?" Naruto gave a nod, smiling up at Denziel.

Suddenly, the sound of something rushing through the air filled his ears.

"GET DOWN" Roared Kakashi. The group threw themselves to the floor, with Denziel dragging Naruto down with him, and Kake pulling the bridge builder with her.

They pulled themselves back up quickly, to see a massive sword embedded in a nearby wall. It was easily 6 feet long, but that wasn't what drew the eyes towards it. It was that equally huge man standing on the handle of it. He was barechested, aside from a single bandolier-style strap. He wore cow print forearm and ankle warmers, with pale blue pants and his Hitai-ate sideways on his head. the final part of his outfit was bandages covering the lower half of his face, completing the menacing look.

Kakashi glared up at the man. "You six need to stay back. He's a Jōnin ranked missing-nin. None of you would stand a chance against him"

 _'Alright, time to initiate plan bluffboom'_

Denziel took a few steps forward, a cocky grin taking over his face as he stared up at the man. "Oh yeah, he doesn't look so tough. Looks more like he just got finished with his side job at the stripclub. I mean, who the hell goes shirtless when they're a ninja?"

The man gave an ominous chuckle, before hopping down to stare at Denziel. The redhead gulped, as he stared at the man's imposing six feet of height. Now, he'd met people of that height before, Denziel himself being a respectable 5 and a half feet. But there was something about him that just made the boy feel utterly dwarfed. "What's your name, boy?" The man growled down at him.

The sound of the man's voice managed to snap him out of it, and he smirked confidently. He placed a hand on one hip, while the other shot up, pressing his thumb into his chest. "Denziel. Why? you wanna know the name of the one who's gonna kick your ass?"

The man simply chuckled again "No, I just like to know the names of those who are arrogant enough to believe they can take me on. You god damn rookies from the leaf, you don't even know what it takes to be a ninja."

"Oh yeah?" Denziel snarled, before bring his hands up, to slam his fist into the other. "I'm the strongest ninja there is! I'm so strong, I could punch you once and you'd go down!"

This time, the man didn't stop at a chuckle. He burst out into a spree of laughter. The other five genin watching couldn't believe what they were seeing! This wasn't the Denziel they knew! Where had this confidence come from? They were all trembling in fear, and they were about 10 meters away from the man, Denziel was barely 10 feet away!

His laughter ceased, and he glared down at the redhead. "Alright then, if you're so confident. I'll give you one punch. One punch to try and take me down."

Kakashi's eye widened. "Denziel don't! Listen to me, this man is out of your league!"

The boy turned to look at Kakashi over his shoulder and smirked. "Well, maybe he is and maybe he isn't. But it's a worth a shot, isn't it?" He turned back to Zabuza, his fist still curled inside his other hand, before his body started to tremble.

The next second, he shot off, a vague yellow glow surrounding him, he was in front of him in just under a second, the tall figure's eyes widened slightly at the speed of him. "Ultimate technique! DYNAMITE FIST!" He yelled, as he slammed his right fist into the man's stomach.

For a moment, the blow seemed to work, the man's eyes widening, and the two didn't move for a few seconds, before that same laughter started up again. "You call that a punch?" The man glared down at the red head, who's eyes had grown wide and fearful.

"THIS IS A PUNCH" Denziel was sent sprawling back, only to be caught by Kakashi. His left cheek was bright red and he was struggling to get up. Kakashi glared down at the boy.

"What were you thinking?" He growled, helping him to his feet. "Do you even know who that is?"

Denziel smirked up at the silver haired ninja. "Yep, Zabuza Momochi, one of the ex-seven ninja swordsmen"

Kakashi's looked down at him, shocked. "Well if you knew who he is, what made you think you could bring him down with just one punch? I expected better from you!"

Denziel chuckled, then slowly brought his hand up to his face, it was in a basic handsign. "Well, I didn't say it'd be the punch that did it"

Zabuza gasped, looking down at his stomach, where an explosive tag had been stuck where he was punched. There was a large explosion, covering the man in smoke. Immediately Denziel shot up, seemingly unharmed, though his cheek was still red, and was starting to swell up.

Kakashi smirked under his mask, before looking forward. "Well, I'll give you credit, that was a decent plan, but that's not gonna be enough for someone like Zabuza"

The redhead rolled his eyes at him. "Well, I was kinda expecting you to follow up after I activated the tag. Oh well, like I said, it was worth a try. Good luck Kakashi-san" He then leaped back to where his fellow genin were standing. "Team 7!" He snapped. "Form a Manji formation around the bridge builder! Kake, Heiki, tri formation around their formation!"

The two teams hesitated, but then snapped to attention, Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke quickly forming around Tazuna, their Kunai's out. Kake and Heiki leapt back behind the four, taking up the two bottom corners of a triangle, with Denziel being the top point. Kake bent herself low to the ground, her chakra forming around her nails, sharpening them, while Heiki drew his blades.

Kakashi gave a small smile at the redhead's quick thinking, before he pulled his headband out of the way to reveal his second eye. It was entirely red, with a black ring where the outside of the iris would have been. This ring also had three tomoe on it.

"Ah, you've brought your Sharingan out already, I should be honoured, copy-ninja" Zabuza's voice seemed to echo around them, as the mist intensified. Sasuke looked at Kakashi, seemingly shocked at the words of the missing-nin.

Denziel, meanwhile was carefully scanning the mist surrounding them, when that ominous chuckling began again. But this time, it was louder, and it was echoing all around them. All the members of Team 7 were beginning to shake, as were Denziel's teammates. Even the redhead himself, who'd been able to put up a brave front earlier was starting to doubt himself.

 _'Oh god, this feeling. It's like the mist is literally squeezing the hope out of me...That tag did literally nothing to him, and if that couldn't take him down...NO! You can't think like that, it was meant as a diversion, you never really expected it to take him down! But you did hope for it, didn't you? You thought, maybe it could stop him there...'_ His mind a mess, Denziel failed to notice the similar reactions from his comrades, who were all in similar conditions, if not worse. Sasuke was feeling the effects so badly he had started to bring his kunai to his throat just to end the feeling.

"ENOUGH!" Yelled Kakashi from where he was standing, still watching the mist around him for a clue of where Zabuza was hiding. "I understand that you're all afraid, but don't worry. I won't let harm befall any of my comrades. I promise"

This managed to snap them all out of it, letting them focus on the battle at hand. Which was a good thing too, because Zabuza took that time to strike, appearing in the mist just behind Heiki, and was seconds from slicing the boy in half, when he spun to block the massive blade with his own twin swords.

The two locked glares over the clashing metal, the lock struggling back and forth when Kakashi appeared behind the taller swordsman, a kunai in hand. A quick slash caused Zabuza to fall to the ground, but it wasn't quite right. His body suddenly burst into water, with the real Zabuza leaping from the fog to slice Kakashi in half, only for the copy ninja to pull the same trick, bursting into water. A Kunai was placed to the taller man's neck as Kakashi revealed himself behind him.

The two stood there for a few seconds, until Zabuza spoke up. "That was impressive Kakashi, copying my water clone jutsu like that, even with the mist around us" Suddenly, a form dropped down behind the Jōnin "BUT I'M NOT THAT EASY TO FOOL!" The second water clone dissipated as he swung the massive slab of metal. Kakashi ducked it, but this did not deter the swordsman, he simply slammed the sword into the ground before using it as a brace to kick the copy ninja away into the distance.

Kakashi found himself up to his neck in water _'Wait, something's wrong, this water...it's too heavy!'_ Zabuza used this moment to reappear, standing on the water above him running through hand signs. He stuck his hand forward at the Jōnin, the water around him surging up to form a sphere.

"Suiton: Water Prison Jutsu!" Zabuza said smugly, looking down at the imprisoned leaf ninja, as he struggled to escape the orb he was contained inside. "It's too late Kakashi, no-one has scaped my water prison jutsu before without help. You'll slowly drown in their, but first..." He turned to the side, his right hand still occupied with holding the sphere, and made a hand sign with his left. The water at the shore of the river began to surge up and take on a humanoid shape, slowly taking definition and colour untill it was revealed to be the menacing figure of Zabuza. "Suiton: Water Clone Jutsu!"

He chuckled quietly as he glanced down at Kakashi. "I hope you'll enjoy watching your students die before you Kakashi, I know I will. It's children like them that make me hate the leaf village. People from pansy homes like that don't know what being a ninja is truly like!"

Sakura, who had been growing more and more unnerved as he went on, couldn't help but blurt out "What's he talking about?" but this just prompted Zabuza to start laughing again.

"You kids go through a cushy little school, then they slap a headband on you, and they have the nerve to call you ninja? That disgusts me, children like you don't know the first thing about being a ninja! If you had grown up in the hidden mist like I did, their final exam would've straightened you out proper, weeded out the weaklings from the strong!"

Team 7 all nervously looked at each other, all questioning with their eyes if the others knew what he was talking about, but before they could voice their confusion, there was a crackling noise, a flash of yellow light, and everyone turned their eyes back to the middle of the battlefield to see Denziel just pointing at the water clone.

Said water clone now had a hole the size of a fist in it's chest.

It writhed in place for a moment, before exploding into water. The red head marched forward, pulling his right glove down harder, making sure the tight leather was stretched taut against his skin. "The final exam of Kirigakure" He said calmly as he locked eyes with the taller man "A brutal tournament where all the graduating members are given one last instruction"

"If they wish to pass, they must kill one of their classmates"

His yellow eyes bore holes into Zabuza as he glared at him with utter contempt "It was a sick, medieval way of removing their students emotions for their battlefield. But they stopped it just over a decade ago, because during an exam, something went wrong. A child, someone who wasn't even a student, brutally slaughtered every single one of the participants." He stayed glaring at the swordsman, watching his every move.

The man actually looked surprised for once "How did you know about the graduation exam?"

The redhead simply pulled a small book out of his pocket, and showed it to the man. "Bingo Book, I bought it while I was wandering the village a few days ago, and figured I should bookmark all the people I thought were most notable. You were one of them"

Zabuza gave a light shrug "Oh well, not like it'll matter that much, although it is nice to know my achievements speak for themselves" He brought his left hand back up to form a hand sign again, causing three Water Clones to form in front of Denziel.

His eyes narrowed, and he lowered his stance, the book being quickly tossed back in his pocket, and yelled as quick as he could "TEAM 13! FORM UP!" The two members of his team almost instantly appeared at his sides, and he smiled at them both, before turning around to look back at Naruto "Team 7! We'll hold off these clones, you guys figure out a way to free your sensei!" He turned back to the trio in front of him, before giving a shaky breath.

Kake noticed this. "Are you alright?" She breathed out, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.

He gave a short nod "Yeah, but that last attack took a bit out of me, it's been way to long since I used that jutsu, and I used a bit too much chakra" He then smirked at her "You?"

She gave a short nod "I'll be fine" she said shortly, before bringing out two small pills from her pocket, tossing one to Beck, and swallowing the other herself. The changes were instant. Beck's fur turned to a dark red, while her teeth and nails seemed to sharpen, her hair sticking out in some places, and making her seem almost feral in appearance.

Team 13 slowly fanned out, Heiki walking to the right slowly, while Kake did the opposite, and Denziel simply stood his ground. Each locked eyes with a shadow clone before the one on the left finally sprung into action, charging forward at Kake and swinging it's blade down upon her.

As the massive blade slammed down into the floor, the clone looked around to find the girl who had seemingly vanished, while the other two clones leapt into action, one clashing blades with Heiki, while the other performed a horizontal slash which he dodged by leaping back. It glared back up at him, and gave chase.

The clone which had engaged Kake carefully watched all around him, looking for any sign of the girl, when it heard a yell. "FANG OVER FANG!" Screamed Kake's voice, as a strange shape blasted out at him from the forest. He brought his blade up to block it, as he observed it better. It looked almost like a cyclone, but it moved through the air like a drill as it slammed into his guard, causing him to brace his feet so he wasn't sent flying from the force of the whirling tornado of death.

Suddenly, he caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of his eye, and managed to muster enough strength to push away the cyclone, enough so he could swing his sword almost like a baseball bat to knock a second cyclone away from him. He watched as it hit the ground and almost instantly lost it's shape, revealing Kake climbing to her feet. He looked back to the other side to see another Kake readying herself for an attack.

"That was impressive how you managed to intercept me" She growled "But can you do it a second time, I wonder?" With that, she leapt into the air while spinning herself, to form back into the familiar drill-like shape. The second Kake did the same, the two girls circling Zabuza for a few seconds before launching a simultaneous assault. They rushed past him, leaving bare scrapes, where water would dribble out, almost like blood.

After about a minute of this, they both came at him from one direction, orbiting around each other until one pulled out, letting the first slam into his guarding sword, only for the second swirling mass to rush around and drill into his back, causing the water clone to dissipate almost immediately thanks to the force it was under from both sides.

The ginger twins both made a dignified landing before looking to her two male teammates, only to see Denziel simply dodging the slow attacks of his opponent. She also noticed that he'd been watching her battle, and he was still looking at her, even as he backflipped over a heavy horizontal slash.

He smirked at her surprise "That was amazing Kake! That juts kicked so much ass!" She giggled slightly at his enthusiasm, but quickly looked back to the water clone fighting him. He saw her gaze and gave a chuckle "Yeah, I should probably put this sorry thing out of it's misery, huh?" He then performed a swift roll to the left as the slab of metal smashed into the ground where he'd been just moments before. This was followed by a series of backflips to gain distance.

He then brought his right hand up in front of his face, in a modified version of the hand sign he had held to detonate the tag earlier. The only difference being that his other hand was gripping his wrist tightly. Yellow sparks began to crackle around his index and middle finger which were pointing straight up, while the rest were curled around each other.

He grunted in concentration, as bolts of electricity began to arc off, his entire hand starting to glow with a yellow light. The cloned swordsman wasn't going to take this sitting down of course, as he charged forward, his sword ready to strike. Denziel simply smirked, as the writhing arcs of electricity began to flail about more and more. He then let go with his second hand, and threw his right hand forward to point at the clone.

"RAITON: LIGHTNING BOLT JUTSU!" He roared, as a jagged bolt of yellow chakra fired out of his fingers, with smaller sparks and bolts shooting out of his hand in random directions.

The main bolt stayed on course however, and ripped through the chest of the clone, leaving a hole about the size a kunai would leave. As soon as the bolt had gone through him, it quickly vanished, dispersing into the air almost instantly. In fact, the entire process had taken roughly 2 seconds, as the bolt had shot forward with unbelievable speeds. The redhead grinned and lowered his hand, his breathing a touch heavier than normal, but not enough to raise concern.

His ginger haired teammate watched the entire exchange in shock, that bolt had been so fast! However, her leader didn't seem to regard it as anything special as he walked over, looking at the pair of Kunoichi "So, you can form Shadow Clones? What's the story behind that? Naruto said that jutsu required immense amounts of chakra…'

She looked at him as she processed his question before laughing quietly "Oh, this isn't the shadow clone jutsu, this is an Inazuka Clan Technique, the Man Beast Clone" As she said these words, the second Kake gave a smile at Denziel, then was engulfed in smoke to reveal a happily panting Beck.

Denziel was almost floored by this technique "Woah! That's cool!" He then knelt down to riffle the dog's ears "Nice job, boy" He whispered to him, before standing and looking over his shoulder to the sound of metal clashing.

Standing at the river side, Heiki and the final water clone were engaged in a battle of the blades, the taller swordsman swinging his sword heavily, while the shorter boy gracefully dodged around the slices, clearly having the time of his life

"I've read all about you, Momochi-Senpai" He said, in an almost reverent tone, his two blades coming together to block a heavy overhead slash. As he said the words, he mostly disregarded the Zabuza he was clashing with, but was instead facing to his right, where the real Zabuza stood on the water. "To face someone like you in battle, it's an honour" The water clone brought it's blade around for a straight thrust, but Heiki pushed it to the side with one of his blades, while thrusting forward with the second. The clone jumped to the side to dodge, but was still left with a cut in it's side, which began to leak water.

The two swordsmen faced each other, before rushing in to clash blades once more. This time, they seemed at a stalemate, until a spinning noise was heard. Denziel looked behind him, to see Team 7 all standing together, with Sasuke spinning a Fūmashuriken.

He let it loose, hurling it at the water clone, but he and Heiki both simply stepped apart, to let the blade rush past them. "HEY!" Heiki yelled angrily at the team. "Don't just step into my fights! I don't need your help!"

Sasuke just smirked cockily "I wasn't aiming for the clone" he said, looking behind the duelling pair. The shuriken had continued on, rushing straight at the real Zabuza. "He'll have to dodge, meaning he'll have to disperse the prison he's got Kakashi-sensei inside."

Zabuza just stared at the shuriken as it rushed at him, before snatching it out of the air with practised ease. "Nice idea kiddos, but it'll take a lot more tha-" but he was interrupted, as a second rushing noise was heard.

' _A second shuriken? Hidden in an illusion in the shadow of the first!'_ thought Zabuza, shocked the young ninja had managed to pull off a plan like that. With both his hands occupied, the rogue ninja watched as the spinning blades got closer and closer until…

He leapt over the blade, letting it fly off behind him. What he didn't see was the smirk on Sasuke's face. The shuriken behind him suddenly burst into smoke, revealing Naruto! The Blonde boy wasted no time, and hurled a Kunai at Zabuza's arm that was connected to the water prison.

The Swordsman glared back at Naruto, and ripped his arm out of the jutsu, using the momentum to spin himself and hurl the shuriken he was holding right at the boy.

Naruto gulpsed in shock, he was still in mid air thanks to his previous stunt, he couldn't move himself out of the way! He squeezed his eyes shut as he saw it getting closer and closer when-

*SQUELCH*

He felt himself hit the surface of the water, and opened his eyes to see a horrible sight. Denziel had taken off running across the water the moment Zabuza had caught the first shuriken, so he'd had enough of a head start to run in between Naruto and Zabuza.

However, to get the extra speed he'd needed, he'd shed his thick leather jacket.

And now he had one of the spikes of the shuriken sticking right through his stomach.

Naruto's eye's widened, as he swam towards Denziel, who was still somehow standing on top of the water. The redhead looked down at the blonde with a small smirk. "We really need to stop meeting like this" He gave a short chuckle, before collapsing forward with a groan.

"Denziel!" yelled the shorter boy, grabbing him before he could sink into the water. Thankfully, the tall boy was very thin, and didn't weigh too much. As he pulled the boy's arm over his houlder, he looked up to see Kakashi and Zabuza both battling atop the water, seemingly at a stalemate, untill they both began to run through handsigns.

Just as it seemed like they would be trapped in this mirror battle forever, the copy ninja managed to speed up, sending a massive surge of water into the missing nin, sending him crashing into a tree over on the shore. Several Kunai were sent flying into him, pinning him to the bark, as Kakashi slowly walked toward the man, ready to land the killing blow.

Denziel's teammates , confident the Jōnin could take it from here, rushed to the water edge to help Naruto drag their leader out of the water. Kake quickly began to go through her bag for bandages, while Heiki did what he could to dry the boy off using a towel from his bag.

They all turned when they heard Sakura yelling from behind them. There was a short figure standing in front of Zabuza's body, which now had a pair of needles sticking out of it's neck. They wore a green Haori with white edges and a brown sash around the waist. Their face was covered with a mask, which was white, had the Kirigakure symbol where the forehead would be, a pair of slits for eyes, and a red wave pattern across the bottom half.

Kakashi regarded the figure with caution, before turning to Sakura. "Be quiet Sakura, this shinobi is a member of the Mist Village's elite hunter ninja." This stopped the girl's shouting, but she still glared at the hunter-nin.

Said Hunter-nin politely bowed to the Leaf ninja "Thank you for helping me stop Momochi-san" He said in a quiet feminine voice "I have been tracking him for several days but was unsure I could finish him myself" He then turned and grabbed Zabuza's body, held up a simple handsign, before they both disappeared in a blur of motion.

Zabuza sighed, moving his headband down over his Sharingan eye, before turning around toward team 7. He only made it a few steps before he collapsed. Heiki ran over to check on him, while Kake continued to bandage up Denziel. "He's fine!" She said over her shoulder, as she carefully checked him over "I think he's just got Chakra exhaustion. Old man, can you lead us to your home?"

Tazuna nodded, before turning and heading in the direction of his village "Of course, if we hurry we should make it in just quarter of an hour" The group hurried after him, with each team carrying their respective leader, desperately hoping they'd be okay...

* * *

About half a mile away...

The hunter-nin stared down at Zabuza's body as it rested in a small clearing. He crouched down, and reached out for the needles in his neck, but was interupted by a hand which shot up and grabbed his wrist.

Zabuza's eyes opened and glared up at the mask above him. "Well I didn't expect that to go so badly. I don't think we'll be able to take care of them. If it had been just Kakashi and his team, we'd have managed, but that other team...they're good..."

The masked boy cocked his head "What are you saying, Zabuza-sama? That we should abandon our mission?"

The swordsman laughed and rested his head back on the ground as he carefully pulled the two needles out of his throat. "No no...We need that money too badly to just abandon the job. But...Gatō hired us to deal with a single team and their Jōnin sensei. I think we could convince him to hire one more ninja to deal with the extra team...and I know just the one..."

 **A/N Alright! Finally got into some fight scenes! Very happy with how it came out, looking very much forward to how it might become. So, Zabuza is bringing in reinforcements! Big props to anyone who can guess what character he'll be bringing in!**

 **Also, finally, Team 13 get to strut their stuff, I'm hoping none of it seemed too OP, bear in mind they were facing off against water clones, so they were a fraction of Zabuza's strength.**

 **Well, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, more will be coming soon!**


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

Bright yellow eyes shot open and darted left and right for a moment before settling on the quietly watching Jōnin above him.

"What up, Kakashi-san?" Denziel chuckled, pulling himself up into a sitting position, as he observed the man's wounded appearance. The Jōnin was leaning on a crutch. Denziel went to stand up, but was stopped with a harsh pain from his abdomen.

"Easy there, that Shuriken hit you pretty bad" Kakashi said, placing his hand on the boy's shoulder.

Denziel shook his head, forcing himself to his feet. He grunted, clutching his stomach, but made his way to the door. He looked down for a moment, to see he was wearing pajamas that used to be in his backpack. He looked over at the man behind him, who raised his arms in defense.

"Woah, don't look at me, it was Heiki who dressed you" The redhead rolled his eyes, before turning to his backpack. It was resting next to four other bags, which he assumed to belong to the other men in their group.

"Get out then, I need to get changed, then I need to check on my team" Kakashi nodded, then walked out of the room, leaving the boy in peace.

Five minutes later, the two leaders walked out of the small building, after being pointed in the right direction by Tazuna. They walked through the forest for a while but before they saw anything, they heard shouting.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT YOU LUNATIC? HOW THE HELL ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO THAT?"

"Well, if you would shut the hell up and let me talk, pinky, I would tell you."

This was then followed with shocked shouts from what sounded like Naruto. The pair walked through one last shrub, to see Kake and Heiki both standing upside down on a branch. Naruto was on the floor in the clearing, gaping up at the two, while Sakura looked mildly surprised and Sasuke was just deadpanning the pair.

"Now, this is one of the most basic forms of chakra manipulation" Heiki calmly explained, gazing down at the trio. "You simply channel chakra into the soles of your feet. Now, the amount differs from person to person, so you'll just have to do some trial and error with it, too much chakra is going to send you flying away from the tree, while not using enough will...well, just do nothing" He glanced up, or down depending on your view, and smiled as he saw the two team leaders standing behind Team 7.

A careful flip, and he was on the ground, with Kake following close behind him. "Hey Kakashi-san. Do you want to take over from here?" she asked cheerfully.

Kakashi gave a short nod, before carefully walking forward, past his team, and then began limping up the tree using his chakra. Denziel smiled at the two, and with a short gesture of his head, the three leapt up into the trees to find a suitable training ground. Beck, who had been sitting next to Naruto, got up and followed the group.

They leapt from branch to branch for a while untill they found a small clearing adjacent to a small lake. Denziel wandered over to the water's edge, before striding out onto the water itself. He then sat himself down with his legs crossed and smirked at his teammates.

Heiki returned the smirk with a huge grin of his own, before running confidently out onto the surface. He made it a few meters before he began to sink. thinking fast, he pushed chakra to his feet, only to find himself flying into the air.

Denziel sighed and got to his feet, waiting for the other boy to land. when he did, the redhead calmly reached into the water to pull him up and onto his feet again. He grunted from the exertion of carrying him, but just barely managed to pull him to the shore. "Now again, but slowly. Take your time with it."

Kake nervously approached the edge with Beck on her shoulder, before slowly putting a foot out. she pressed it against the water, gauging the surface's reaction to her foot. She did this for a while, carefully increasing the chakra she was putting forward. Once she felt it was enough, she slowly walked out onto the surface and stood there for a few seconds. A joyous grin stretched over her face, and she cheered. This lack of focus caused her chakra to flicker, and she plummeted into the water.

Denziel pulled her up with a small chuckle, and let her regain her balance. The trio trained their water walking for a few hours, before heading to the shore to rest. Kake blushed slightly, as she tugged at her shorts slightly, the water causing them to cling to her tightly.

"Stand still" Denziel said, raising his palm to point at her. She did so, and watched as the air around his hand began to twist and twirl strangely, his face contorted into a look of concentration. He then pushed his palm forward, sending a wave of air into the girl. The water flew off of her, leaving her clothes still damp, but they were at least not completely soaked.

Denziel growled quitely, and shook his head, looking angered. "What's up?" asked Kake, trying to figure out the source of his irritation.

He sighed, and looked down at his hand, frowning lightly "It's nothing..." He muttered.

"It's clearly not, with the look you're pulling" Heiki chuckled, wringing out his jacket.

"It's just...that jutsu was pathetic" He muttered, charging up his hand again, the air twisting around, untill he turned and fired at a nearby tree. It moved slightly, as if hit by a slightly strong wind. "GOD DAMNIT! THAT TOOK ALL I COULD MUSTER! AND SHE COULD'VE DESTROYED THAT TREE WITHOUT BREAKING A SWEAT!"

Kake backed away from him, having never seen this side of the boy before. Heiki however, moved closer, curious. "Who could've?" He asked slowly.

Denziel turned with another sigh, and turned toward them. "My Nee-chan" he breathed. He sank to the ground, and crossed his legs, as he began to draw in the sand with his fingers. "I met her not long after I left the lightning village. She lived alone, her family had died years before, but she took care of herself in this little shack outside of a minor village."

The two others quitely took seats next to him, along with Beck. He continued to trace a small house with two small stick figures alongside it. "I'd stopped in a tree nearby for the night, and she found me in the morning. She let me come into her house and gave me some food."

"I told her about how I'd been taught about the tree walking, and she asked if I wanted to learn some more. Apparantly there was some old man from the nearby village who was a retired ninja, and he had taught her a few bits and pieces. So I stuck around, and we grew close."

He looked up at the sky with a wistful look on his face, as he thought back. "She was incredible, she could do all kinds of stuff with the air, she could use it to engrave words or pictures in rocks, she could even knock someone out, just by manipulating the air pressure near their ears."

The pair listened on, surprised at the power this girl apparantly had. "How old was she at the time?" Kake asked.

"She must've been about 11, that's how old I was." He looked back down at the drawings in the sand, slowly tracing a spiral in the air near one of the stick figures. "We sparred for hours some days, and she was really smart. She never pushed me to do something I couldn't do, instead, she taught me to look for another way around it..."

* * *

A young Denziel stared across the field at an untouched mannequin. Kunai littered the ground surrounding it, and he looked to the side at his sister figure. "I can't do it!" He cried, throwing the weapon in his hand down. He sunk to the floor, hands covering his face, as he tried to hide his shame at letting her down.

"Well, you've got to figure out how to get your kunai over there" She said calmly, walking over. She picked up a kunai, and put it back in his hand, before pulling him to his feet. She then turned him toward the mannequin and whispered in his ear. "Now just think...how can you move the kunai, in a way that will send it at the mannequin fast enough to puncture it?"

The redhead stared down at the blade in his hand, thinking furiously. His hand-eye coordination would never let him throw the Kunai the way other ninja did, as it would always fly off in a random direction. He thought carefully... _'The reason I can't do it, is my hand is moving too fast to judge when I need to let go...so I need to use a way to keep my hand still...'_

He looked up, holding the kunai in his hand by the ring on the end. He held up his hand so it was facing the mannequin, the kunai pointing the same way. His mine raced, trying to find a way around it...then another hand embraced his from behind, and pulsed chakra through his hand gently. He watched as the kunai jumped forward, landing on the ground several feet in front of him. His eyes widened, as the final puzzle piece landed right in his lap!

An hour later, he grinned, panting from the chakra he'd expended. But it was worth it, as he gazed at the mannequin which was now covered in Kunai which he'd been able to hit it with. And it was all thanks to her...

* * *

He smiled as he drew a lightning bolt next to the second stick figure. "She was the reason I was able to get where I am today" He pushed himself backwards to stare into the sky. "I'd be nowhere without her."

Kake tilted her head curiously "So, what happened to her?"

"Oh, nothing" He chuckled, pushing himself back up to look at his teammates. "I stayed there for about half a year, but then I wanted to move on. I get antsy, I hate staying in one place for too long. She liked it where she was, so she stayed. I told her that if I ever found a nice place to stay, I'd go back and find her, so she knew I was alright."

He gave a low sigh, then got to his feet. He gazed across the water, before lookng back at the other two. "Come on, we'd better get back to training."

As he turned back to the water, something caught his eye. A flash of pale skin in the trees. "Hey there!" He called in the direction he saw the person. "Don't worry, you can come out!"

A few moments later, a figure creeped out from behind a tree. It was a girl, looking around about their age wearing a pink kimono with spiral designs. She had a kindly smile, which extended past her mouth and up to her joyful brown eyes.

"Hello there" She quitely greeted the group, walking towards them slowly. Denziel took note of the basket of herbs and plants she held in her right hand, the left hand supporting it from below.

He gave a friendly smile, raising a hand for the girl to shake. "It's nice to meet you, We're Team 13"

She returned the smile, and the handshake. "My name is Haku, I hope I didn't disturb you, I was just gathering plants for a friend of mine, he's quite sick."

Heiki nodded his head, recognising several of the plants in her basket as ones his Uncle Shikaku would use to help the deer when they were ill. "You weren't disturbing us at all, it's most likely quite the reverse actually."

The girl chuckled at the boy's concern. "Oh no, don't worry about it. It's actually nice to see some friendly faces around this forest. Normally I get quite lonely." As she said this, her eyes took on a darker look.

Denziel noticed this, and spoke up. "Do you not have any family? No brothers or sisters who could help you?"

She gave a small shake of her head. "No, just my friend. He's almost like a father to me honestly." She looked down at her basket of plants, before looking back at the group of ninja. "Why do you fight?"

The three teammates looked at each other for a moment, before turning back to the girl. "What do you mean?" Kake asked.

"You are all Konoha Shinobi, so you must have to fight, yes? Why do you fight?" She persisted.

Heiki gave a small shrug. "I guess...I fight to improve my skills?" Kake stroked Beck's head gently as she thought on it "I fight to uphold the honor of my village."

Denziel scratched his chin, trying to think about the last few times he'd fought. seeing if he could find a common theme. Immediately, he felt his stomach throb in light pain, as he remembered th Shuriken from yesterday, and the circumstances surrounding how he was hit by it.

He clenched his hand firmly, and looked at Haku. "I fight to defend those close to me, to make sure they never have to come to harm."

The girl nodded happily at this response "I believe if you have to fight, it should only ever be to protect those around you." She glanced down at the basket in her hands, before turning away. "I need to get going now, but it was very nice to meet all of you."

She walked back out into the forest, clutching the basket tightly, to hide the Senbon needles concealed in the bottom.

Kake smiled as she watched the girl leave. "She was nice" She said quitely, before Beck leapt up at her leg, barking frantically. "You're sure?" The dog nodded, barking a few more times. Kake looked back up at her teammates, pure shock in her eyes. "He says, that was the hunter-nin that killed Zabuza."

Denziel gaped, looking back at where the girl left. "We need to tell Kakashi-san! Now!" He darted up into the trees, the three others following him closely. They ran for a few minutes before reaching Tazuna's home. Denziel turned back to his teammates. "I'll talk to him privately, don't mention this to the others." He whispered to them, before they walked into the house.

The other team wasn't back yet, so Team 13 quitely occupied themselves, with Heiki doing maintenance on his swords, Kake playing fetch with Beck, and Denziel distracting himself by letting lightning chakra dance between his fingertips, casting strange and distorted shadows onto the wall behind him.

After several hours of this, Kakashi arrived back with his team. Denziel quickly snatched him away to discuss Haku. The Jōnin frowned, turning to look out of the window of the spare bedroom they were in. "This could mean several things. One of the biggest possibilities: Zabuza is still alive, and is regaining his strength as we speak."

Denziel nodded, having reached the same conclusion. "So, what do we do?"

Kakashi shook his head. "Nothing. We stay the course we are already on. Train in anything we can, I won't be telling my team about this. Knowing them, they'd probably try something foolish."

"Alright, I understand" Denziel turned, and the two went downstairs to eat dinner which was prepared by Tazuna's daughter Tsunami.

The third member of their team was Tsunami's young son, Inari. He glared at the Ninja throughout the whole meal, which finally boiled over later when he let loose an ouburst.

"WHY THE HELL ARE YOU EVEN HERE? THERE'S NO POINT, YOU'RE ALL GOING TO DIE IN THE END SO YOU MAY AS WELL LEAVE!" He screamed furiously. The Konoha shinobi all stared the boy down.

Naruto decided to fire back though. "Oh yeah? How the hell do you know? We're gonna kick Gatō's butt!"

The small boy stood up from his chair, getting face to face with the blonde. "No-one can beat Gatō! You're all going to die, and that's all there is to it!"

The blonde growled angrily. "What the hell do you know,you don't know how strong we are!"

"IT'S YOU WHO DOESN'T KNOW ANYTHING!" Inari screamed, before marching up to his bedroom. The rest of the people in the room watched him leave, except for Denziel who grabbed Naruto's shoulder and pulled him back into his seat.

Tazuna sighed, and set his bowl aside, and apologised for Inari's actions, before he told them all a story. A story about a man called Kaiza, who was Inari's stepfather. He had saved the boy from drowning one day, and swiftly became the village's hero, even swimming through a flooding river to save their harvest.

However, all of that changed when Gatō arrived. He had Kaiza executed in front of the entire village, traumatizing Inari, while simultaneously breaking the population's spirit.

The Ninja sat around the table, listening quitely. Sakura actually started crying at one point. Denziel stood up once it finished, heading for the stairs.

"Wait!" Kake cried, chasing after him. He turned to look at her. "Where are you going?" She asked.

"I'm going to go get some sleep, then the first thing in the morning, we're leaving to go train some more." He replied simply. Kake went to respond, but decided against it, and just nodded. He nodded to the others, before walking upstairs.

* * *

The next day, Team 13 went back to their training area. Upon landing, Denziel pulled out a scroll from his backpack, and handed it to Kake. "It's time we step up our training. We'll be learning water walking, but we'll also be doing combat training. I got those for you."

Kake looked down at the scroll, then opened it, unsealing the item from inside it. She gasped at what she saw, the weapons inside impressing her with their brilliance, yet simplicity.

And so it was that they trio began to train. Denziel trained using his Lightning bolt Jutsu, Heiki practised with his Katanas.

And Kake and Beck would train to learn in perfect unison, using the chain linked gauntlets of the Demon Brothers.

 **A/N Well, hoping you guys are enjoying it so far!**

 **This was a fairly short chapter, but next time we'll be stepping it up with some more fight scenes, the fall of a comrade, and a rage unleashed...and not the ones you'll be expecting...**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N Alright, we're now on to the final chapter I have finished at the moment, so it may be a while until the next one. Now onto some other things, I've been in discussion with the reviewer who mentioned about Denziel's name, and he made some very decent points. Denziel stays for now, but if I find a decent working name, I may consider changing it.**

 **In other news, I've only just discovered that the way I split scenes in WordPad (a massive row of hyphens) didn't convert in doc manager, so I'll be going through and editing them in. Shouldn't take long, and will hopefully make the pacing seem a bit more relaxed. Or maybe people are fine without them, I don't know, that's what reviews are for.**

 **Anyway, I've babbled long enough, time for the main event...enjoy!**

Chapter Five

Loud zapping sounds filled the clearing as Denziel fired bolt after bolt into a tree. After the fifth, the trunk began to tilt to one side, then collapsed to the ground. He panted, turning around to look at his team.

They were both sparring against trees, Kake leaving deep gouge marks with her claws, while Heiki was carving intricate patterns and symbols with his twin blades.

Denziel couldn't help but let his mind wander to the past seven days. The two teams had fallen into a routine after the first day. While one team trained and sparred, the other would guard Tazuna at the bridge.

He glanced down at his hands, still sparking lightly from the use of his Jutsu. He had been trying to refine the jutsu, to the point where he could fire the shots back to back. He had managed this, but the result was a significant lowering of strength. It was an acceptable loss, the Jutsu was never supposed to be incredibly damaging, it was supposed to be quick.

As he contemplated this, he heard movement from nearby, and turned, just in time to see Kakashi leap down from a branch above. "Denziel! It's Zabuza! He's at the bridge!" He snapped.

The redhead nodded quickly, ordering the other two to move out, before pausing, a thought occuring to him. He then flew through several hand signs, before landing on a familar cross-shaped seal.

"Lightning Shadow Clone Jutsu!" He yelled, a second version of himself coming into existence next to him. He glared at the copy, before barking out orders at Kakashi. "You two go and defend Tsunami at the house, they'll be vulnerable without our help."

Kakashi's shadow clone nodded sharply, before taking off with the redheaded clone. The original dashed off after his team, making best speed to the bridge.

* * *

He caught up to the pair of them soon, with all three arriving at their destination in minutes. The air was misty, but it also smelled of blood. Much blood had been shed this day. The trio stared across the bridge to try and survey the situation.

Kakashi and Zabuza were clashing near the middle of the bridge, the Jōnin barely holding against the massive blade with just a Kunai.

Off to another side was what looked like a strange dome made out of mirrors, with what looked like Naruto and Sasuke inside. Sakura was cowering further down the bridge, standing in front of the bridge builder.

Before Denziel could make an order, he sensed a chakra presence right above them. "SCATTER!" He yelled, dashing forward. Heiki and Kake heeded his warning, just in time too, as a kunai with an explosive tag hit where they just were and exploded, tearing a chunk out of the bridge and making their ears ring.

Team 13 organised themselves to face their foe: a smug looking man with dark green hair surrounding a headband with the symbol of the rain village. He was holding an umbrella over his head, while the handle of a second one was protruding from over one shoulder.

"So, you're the brats I was hired to deal with. Such a bore..." He drawled, grinning at them with a look of superiority.

"You shouldn't make assumptions of your opponents before they make a move." Growled Denziel, keeping his hands in a basic stance, both in front of him, with the tips pointed vaguely in his enemy's direction.

Heiki and Kake slowly moved, strafing around the man to form up on their leader's flanks, with Beck following close to his master's ankles.

Denziel then pulled a book from his pocket, checking some of the bookmarks that were sticking out before settling on a page and scanning it's contents. "Aoi Rokushō." He stated calmly. "Current Jōnin of Amegakure, but former instructor in Konoha. You defected from the village after you tricked your student into stealing a precious artifact." He pocketed the book, locking eyes with the man. "Your head would catch a decent price back in our village."

The now named Aoi chuckled. "So, it seems my reputation precedes me, I'm almost embarrassed, would you like an autograph?"

The redhead simply glared at the man. Aoi's purple eyes lost their joking shine and took on a more sinister glare. "Well, I suppose I should end this quickly." He grunted, before drawing his second umbrella and hurling both into the air. "SENBON SHOWER!"

Heiki quickly dashed in front of his two teammates, bringing up his twin katanas to try and block his vital organs. _'If I can block this, at least the two of them can finish him off...I hope...'_

Suddenly, his blades did something no-one expected them to do. They contorted. They twisted and bent out of shape, forming themselves into almost an umbrella shape in front of the three teens.

The thin senbon needles which fired from the two umbrellas bounced off the shield harmlessly, littering the ground with the metal spikes. Heiki quickly dropped his deformed weapons to the ground, staring at their new useless shape.

Denziel took the opportunity, charging straight for Aoi, firing off lightning bolts at him in quick succession. The Jōnin dodged in and out of the bolts of Jutsu, feeling the warmth of the jagged charges of chakra passing so close to his face.

"Kake! Now!" She followed her leader's order, rushing forward, closely followed by her man-beast clone. Each wore a metal gauntlet on one hand. Kake on her right, Beck on his left.

The gauntlets were a dark grey in color mostly, with the fingertips and claws being a silver metal. The thick metal rings had been expertly detached with Heiki's help, as they figured chains would likely have just got in the way.

Aoi recognised the weapons instantly, and leaped into the air to catch his umbrellas. He landed just in front of Kake, bringing his arm up to block her claws with the tool. The simple-looking device was actually quite strong, the metal behind the fabric actually being a chakra-infused form of steel. Mostly a precaution to stop kunai and other ranged attacks.

He quickly brought the second one up to deflect a slash from Beck, and slammed his boot into the clone's hip, knocking him back for a moment. He took this brief reprieve to swing his second umbrella down on Kake's head.

She glanced up, and quickly caught it, her chakra flaring to extend her nails. She glared at him, as she swiftly began to bend it in her hand.

The Jōnin growled, The metal was never designed for a confrontation like this! It had been made to be thin, so he could spin them with extra speed. He grunted as he tried to swing his first umbrella forward in her grip, but she simply pushed it aside, moving to slice his stomach.

He dropped both of his improvised weapons and leapt back, only to hear a growl to his right. A glance told him that Beck was dashing forward fast, too fast to dodge. So he unleashed his last resort.

 ***SLICE* *ZAP***

An anguished moan erupted from the downed canine, as he fell away from the glowing yellow blade the former leaf nin now wielded. Kake gasped, dashing to the side of her fallen partner, cradling his limp form.

The black fur on his belly was matted and stained red with blood. There were also a few sparks darting out of the wound, as if the pup had been electrocuted.

Kake gently laid him down on the ground, before getting to her feet slowly. Aoi laughed smugly. "Now you see why Amegakure accepted me! I wield the legendary Raijin! The blade forged by the Second Hokage himself! I am unbeatable with this weapon!"

Her back began to shake, and a light began to glow around the girl, her chakra becoming so palpable you could see it. A bright silver energy swirling around her, fitting to her body like a glove. She turned to look at him, her narrowed eyes had changed, their color matching the energy she had summoned.

If you blinked, you'd have missed her movement, as she darted forward, straight at the man. She slammed her gauntlet straight at him, the sword barely coming up in time to stop it. She snarled at him, baring her canines and growling loudly.

Denziel was watching from the side next to Heiki, who was doing what he could to bandage Beck's wound. "You ever seen her like this?" The redhead questioned.

The other boy shook his head. "Nah, though I've never seen Beck hurt before either. Well, here's hoping she manages to take him out quick, she'll burn herself out like this if not."

"No"

"No?"

"She's not going to win."

Heiki looked at his leader in disbelief. "What do you mean, look at him! He can barely hold her back!"

"I hate to use such a demeaning term, but she's acting very...feral." Denziel sighed, pulling his trenchcoat off and dropping it to the floor beside him. "I need to get her out of there-"

Just as he said this, Aoi pushed back with his weapon, and the glowing yellow blade split cleanly through her gauntlet, ripping just past her hand and tearing into the girl's stomach.

She gasps, the initial pain from the wound combined with the electricity continuously surging from the sword and directly into her bloodstream.

He ripped the blade out, and made to slice her head clean off when a yellow figure grabbed the girl and dashed back with her, missing the blade by inches.

Denziel carefully lowered her to the ground next to Heiki, who quickly got to work checking her wound. It had gone all the way through, but had by some miracle missed her vital organs.

The redhead simply turned around and walked forward across from Aoi, slowly moving one foot in front of the other and spreading his arms out to the sides, almost like he was forming the shape of a T.

The green haired man laughed arrogantly "HA! You're just lining up one by one you pathetic weaklings!" He raised the sword up to point straight at the boy "Come on, just try it!"

Denziel grunted "Alright then, I will." In a flash of yellow, he dashed in front of the man, lashing out with a roundhouse kick. It was blocked by the blade, but instead of being electrocuted, the sparks of the blade simply clashed against his foot.

Much like Kake before him, an aura of chakra was surrounding Denziel, this one being yellow. However, while hers had been almost skintight and thick, his was barely visible. You wouldn't know it was there if not for the sparks constantly darting through it. Many were concentrated in his foot, surging against the blade.

Suddenly, his foot twitched, and he darted backwards, the sword being pushed towards it's wielder. He spun his hands around so their palms were facing behind himself. Again, he was blasted forward with a boost of speed, this time leaping into the air for an axe kick.

Aoi brought his sword up to block again, but the boy's light weight allowed him to simply use the blade as a stepping stone, dropping down behind the man and kicking him hard in the back.

The blow knocked the Jōnin a few feet back before he caught himself, spinning around to deflect another kick. The two locked glares, Aoi was furious, while Denziel had very little emotion on his face, save for his eyes.

They burned with a hatred the Jōnin had seen very few times before, in fact, if you were to ask Aoi, right then? He'd say they were almost GLOWING with rage.

He repeated the motion with his foot again, and as he did, Aoi heard a noise. It was almost like a gust of air, but it was louder, with more force. Denziel went flying away from him, coming to a stop a few metres away.

He grit his teeth, exhaustion already starting to take over. His stamina had never been that good, and while wearing his weighted coat was helping with that, he still tired quickly. He had to end it, now.

He extended his arms again, but bent them at the elbows. The noise was heard again, almost a whistling noise. Then Denziel lifted both feet gently off the ground. He hovered for a moment staring at the man before he lightly twisted his wrists again, shooting forward.

His foot crashed into the blade once again, lightning crashing out from where they met, and brought the foot back to kick again. He delivered multiple kicks at high speeds, each one pushing Aoi back further and further. He felt an ache starting to course through his arms as they continued to take the force of the blows.

Denziel then started to use both feet to his advantage. He began to spin in the air, delivering a kick with each foot as it passed. Aoi wasn't fast enough to block them all, as several managed to hit him in different areas. His stomach, his hip, a few managed to slam into his legs. Then the final blow came, as the teen was now spinning like a top, becoming just a yellow spiral.

His foot came round, slamming into the Jōnin's arm. A loud crack was heard, and he dropped his sword, clutching his arm in agony.

Denziel didn't waste the opportunity, stopping his spin and quickly snatching up the weapon. Aoi glared back up at him, and pulled out a kunai with his right hand, his left arm now unusable.

He lunged forward, trying to land a blow on the teen, but it was to late. The moment he lost the Raijin, he had no hope of winning. Denziel swiftly sliced through the kunai, before lunging out to slash at him.

The Jōnin leapt back, pulling out another kunai, but it met the same fate as the last as Denziel swung forward with his sword, this time tearing the small blade in half as well as digging the glowing yellow blade into Aoi's shoulder.

The two froze in place, staring into each other's eyes.

Denziel's bright orbs stared deep into the purple lenses of his adversary. So much of his body, the adrenaline pumping through his veins, the simple logic in his mind, everything was telling him to end it. A simple swing of his arm, that would be all it took.

Grip the handle tightly, then bring his arm left. The blade would cut through the muscles in his shoulder and straight through his throat. Blood would spill, the man would collapse, he would harm no-one else. He had read his entry in the bingo book, this man had done terrible things.

The redhead focused on the handle, gripped tightly and swung it across. A dull thud was heard, and Aoi collapsed to the concrete of the bridge.

Denziel panted, and looked down at the still gently rising and falling chest of his enemy. He then cast his gaze down to the handle in his hand. The blade had condensed down into pure lightning chakra and been sealed inside the hilt once he squeezed a certain part of the grip.

He couldn't bring himself to end his life. He knew that it was the logical thing to do, it would be so much easier to sever his head and move on, than to let him live and have to secure him. But at the same time, there was no point. If he killed the man, it would all be over for him, his pain would end.

He didn't deserve that. Such a thing was far too quick. He quickly buckled the hilt to his hip, but before he could do anything more, he realised he hadn't felt something while he was fighting: an unbelievably powerful level of chakra coming from somewhere on the bridge. It wasn't just chakra however...it felt...angry, or in pain.

"It's the Kyuubi..." He mumbled, trying to peer through the fog, but it was to no avail. He could see the ice mirror dome just barely, but he could also make out what looked like blue electricity surging at another point of the bridge.

He turned to Heiki "Deal with Aoi. Bind his hands, then go see if Naruto and Sasuke are alright. I'm going to help Kakashi."

Heiki nodded, before moving toward Aoi. With that dealt with, Denziel sprinted back up the bridge, where the fog was heaviest. He squinted through the mist, then saw a figure sprinting at another, a glowing light in their hand.

A simple thought process went through his head. If that was Kakashi attacking, then the battle was won. He could leave him, and then it would be won. But if that was Zabuza attacking, then Kakashi had to be saved.

He sprinted for the still body, putting himself between the two. He only just made it in time, bringing up his hands and channeling his chakra to take the hit. He felt the fist slam into his hands, but no pain.

He looked, and saw Kakashi's Sharingan staring at him in shock. "Denziel? What the hell?"

"Sorry Kakashi-san. Couldn't tell which of you was which, wasn't gonna take the risk."

Kakashi shook his head, that wasn't what he was shocked by. "But- how are you blocking me?"

At this, they both looked down at where their hands had met. Kakashi's hand was lit up with a blue light, sparking like electrcity. But so was Denziel's, except his electricity was colored yellow.

The two energies had clashed, but instead of them opposing, the blue electricity was being absorbed by the other. Kakashi's jutsu was slowly shrinking, while the yellow light grew even brighter.

The two pulled away from eachother, both panting with exhaustion, and turned to see something shocking.

Haku was standing directly behind Denziel, her mask smashed and her clothes stained with blood. "Denziel..." She panted, barely able to stay upright. "I had hoped...our paths would not cross again..." She began to fall to the ground, but Denziel quickly caught her. Glancing at her wounds, he noticed that some parts of her outfit were burned, and there were rips that almost looked like claw marks.

He looked up at Kakashi. "You should probably deal with Zabuza, I'm not sure if he'll stay there forever."

This spurred the Jōnin into action, swiftly moving forward. His attack had drained him, so he moved to simply knock the missing nin out, but a noise stopped him.

The clinking of many weapons.

Kakashi turned. With Zabuza defeated, the mist had started to dissipate, revealing a mass of bodies spanning the width of the bridge. The men who took up the group had all seen better days, with many sporting missing teeth, scars, and even a few with eyepatches or artificial replacements for limbs.

A parting formed at the middle, and a man walked to the front. He was very short, even shorter than Naruto. He wore an expensive suit, complete with shaded glasses and a cane. His brown hair fanned out behind him, and he had an arrogant smirk on his face.

Denziel could tell, just from looking at him, that this was Gatō. It wasn't that he recognised him, it was how the man carried himself. He walked along as if he owned the bridge he was walking on.

Now that the mist had cleared, he was able to see the results of Naruto's battle. The blonde was kneeling next to Sasuke, who had been pierced many times by senbon needles. Heiki was kneeling next to him, holding a pair of kunai in a position to defend the pair.

Gatō slowly walked forward, the smirk still on his face as he approached. "So Zabuza, it would seem hiring you was a complete waste of my time and resources. Good thing I hadn't planned on following up on my side."

All the ninjas glared at the man. It was obvious what his plan had been, hire the missing nin to weaken the Konoha teams, then pay the mob of bandits to kill them all. An A-ranked missing nin cost far more than a group of random thugs, even if they were more effective.

The short man stopped by the body of Kake, and glared down at her. He moves his cane forward and jabs her a few times in the face. "Well, I suppose you managed to off at least one of them" He chuckled, not noticing the small black figure charging at him.

"GAGH!" He cried, reeling back and waving his arm in the air, desperately trying to shake loose the small dog that was digging into his wrist with it's fangs. Beck had just came to a few moments ago, had seen what the man was doing to his partner, and quickly came to her rescue.

Beck let go of the man, and leapt back to stand in front of Kake, growling at the small army Gatō had raised.

The man in question snarled, stepping back toward the group and yelling at them "Kill them all!"

The assembled men all readied their weapons, grinning at the chance to spill blood and earn their paychecks. Zabuza spoke. "We have no further quarrel Kakashi. In fact we have a common enemy. How's about we deal with them together?"

"Nah, don't worry about it." Chuckled a voice. The pair turned to see Denziel walking towards them from the side of the bridge, but when they looked back in front of them, Denziel was still looking over Haku's wounds.

"A shadow clone?" Kakashi asked, with the clone nodding as he made it to them.

"Lightning clone actually, but pretty much. I can only barely manage one at a time, but I make do. Leave these creeps to me, they're the kind of people I had to fight all the time back when I worked the bars. He turned and dashed over to Heiki, handing him a pair of scratched and dented swords. "They're pretty crappy, but they'll have to do for now."

Heiki smiled and accepted the blades. Meanwhile, the original Denziel had made his way forward to where Kake was lying. The bandits were all still glaring at them, but seemed to be waiting, as if for some unheard signal. He picked her up gently, trying not to disturb her wounds, and carefully walked back to hand her to Kakashi.

Zabuza smirked. "I can't let you take all the credit kid, besides, I got a score to settle with Gatō now." He looked at his sword lying on the grounded nearby, and hefted it, wincing slightly.

Denziel shrugged, and turned back to the horde of men. "This is gonna be a tough one. We're outnumbered pretty badly.."

"NOT FOR LONG!" Naruto was on his feet, a furious glare on his face, and his hands forming a cross. "They got an army? I'll just have to make one too!"

A massive swathe of the bridge was engulfed in smoke, and when it faded, there were roughly a hundred of his Shadow Clones standing there in various positions.

The bandits took this as the signal to charge, the mass of weapons clashing with the wall of orange jumpsuits, Denziel's clone and Heiki both rushing headfirst into the battle. Zabuza looked down at the boy standing next to him.

"Just remember, Gatō is mine."

Denziel simply looked back up with a small smile

"Only if you get to him first."

 **A/N So, this chapter didn't go as I'd planned it. I'd initially wanted it to stop at Kake being taken out and Denziel stepping in to fight Aoi, but changes happen.**

 **By the way, yes, the strange chakra from the both of them WILL be explained, don't worry. But it won't be for a good while.**

 **But anyway, here's hoping you all enjoyed this chapter and next time, we'll have the recovery of our heroes, a great gift being bestowed, and the return home. But until next time...laters!**


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